The Chessman (19 page)

The dead-grandpa creature stepped toward him, the clattering chainsaw held high in the air.

Chapter 23

“H
ow the hell is your hand, Cady?” Allan Sears’ low baritone came through the phone line much like the Cambridge detective himself in real life—loud and clear and demanding.

“About fifty percent. And I think rain is in the forecast,” Cady said, then remembered something. “By the way, Detective, I never got a chance to thank you for the get well card and gift. Fortunately, they had me so morphined up I didn’t turn red when the nurse opened the package.”

Detective Sears laughed for several seconds, then the mirth petered out. “That nurse got something against
Penthouse
?”

“I couldn’t move a muscle at that point so the poor woman gave me a pity laugh and then tossed it on the visitor table for everyone to see.”

Sears chortled again.

“I’ve been reading the headlines and thinking of you, Cady. I thought you’d left the bureau after the…well, you know.”

“I’m back short-term on this assignment.”

“So it turns out it wasn’t Dane Schaeffer after all, huh?”

“Not looking that way.”

“That was the single thing that rubbed me wrong. Guys that plan shit out to the tenth degree like the Chessman aren’t suicidal. They don’t normally toss themselves into the volcano when all is said and done. Know what I mean?”

“That’s pretty much what Detective Pearl said.”

“Pearl, that D.C. homicide cop?”

“Yeah. Worked the Sanfield case. He’s retired now in Boca Raton. I caught him between gin and tonics.”

“I like the guy already. So, Cady, what was your gut check?”

“I wavered at the time. On the one hand the Chessman could have burnt out and gone Andrew Cunanan—if you remember him—killed himself rather than get caught and face the consequences. Plus, there was a certain symmetry. Schaeffer threw these drunken orgies, Schaeffer invited Marly—
he loved Marly
—and per his harsh standard, he was also guilty as hell, so he killed himself in the end. His own judge, jury, and executioner.”

“I’m not that starry-eyed,” Sears said. “Just ask my wife. But there is an old Native American custom that if your enemy has a knife at your throat, you push into it and rob them of the satisfaction of your fear. It’s a control thing. Allows Schaeffer to give us the bird by denying us the catch.”

“After the Farris debacle, Schaeffer was on our short list…and suddenly everything fell into place like dominoes. But Allan, I spent most of my time fixating on the other hand and losing sleep over this nightmare scenario, where the son of a bitch dances away scot-free. Which, unfortunately, turns out to be the case.”

“And you’ve got a copycat in play as well?”

“Thank God that’s not on my plate. I’m cold-casing the original, Allan, and wanted to pick your brain about what really went down back then.”

“Them goddamned Zalentines turned Cambridge into some kind of Goth haven. Adrien and Alain must be giggling on the seventh ring of hell. Flakes in black leather and white makeup take pilgrimages to the Dorchester Towers, to peek at the Zalentines’ old balconies or something. Dahmer never had such a fan base.”

“I saw one of those Internet sites that glamorize them. Twisted stuff.”

Cady gave the Cambridge detective five minutes on what he’d been up to this past week, his nighttime visitor, what he knew about the first victim—Bret Ingram in Minnesota—his false hunch about Eric Braun, and how the Chessman, by all practical appearances, was trying to track his own copycat.

“Why expose himself now?” Sears asked. “After all this time?”

“His was a highly personal vendetta. I don’t think he’s happy with an outsider messing up his magnum opus, his tapestry to Marly Kelch. Imagine if da Vinci caught you painting a moustache on the Mona Lisa.”

“If you could figure out a way to use that fat ego of his against him, Cady, and use it to reel him in,” Sears volunteered. “But I think you’re on the right track. The Chessman stems from the Kelch girl—some kind of wrathful angel raining hell on her behalf. Keep shaking that tree and something might fall out. All you need to know is that you’re after a smart-e…and that’s a damned shame.”

“A smart-e?”

“I know you’ve got those fancy profilers at your beck and call, the ones that’ll tell you what kind of toilet paper the perp prefers—one ply or two—but I tend to follow a simpler, more pared-back methodology by, ironically, the man who invented profiling over two hundred years ago.”

“Who?”

“Napoleon Bonaparte.”

“What?”

“No shit. Bonaparte classified his soldiers into four basic categories and I stole the little emperor’s philosophy and reapplied it to perps. Smart-energetic, smart-lazy, stupid-energetic, and stupid-lazy. Most of the ones I hunt, Cady, fall into the last category—the stupid-lazies. Just last week Cambridge PD picked up this young guy who tried carjacking a Mazda Miata. Thing of it was the Miata had a manual transmission, a five speed, and the dumbass didn’t know how to stick shift. He made it half a block away in first gear by the time the squad car arrived.”

“You’ve got some real doozies there in Cambridge, Detective.”

“Tell me about it. The stupid-lazies make for great comic relief. Now the stupid-energetics, well, they fuck up everyone’s good time, but that’s because they’re mostly politicians. The stupid-energetics were the ones Napoleon wanted to line up and shoot. Can’t say I blame him.” Sears took a long breath and continued, “But you, my friend, you’re after a smart-energetic—a smart-e, that is. They’re the worst.”

“Lucky me.”

“And your smart-e happens to be utilizing all three regions of his brain. Emotion is his motive. As for logic—well, he beat you Fibbies in a chess match. And clearly he’s been exercising his reptilian side, for vengeance and survival.”

“You do have a way of cheering me up, Allan.”

“Watch your back, Cady,” the detective said before hanging up. “This boy won’t be bringing donuts to a gunfight.”

“There was a chess piece in the ashtray.”

Cady had seen Sundown Point Resort on his cell phone caller ID and was pleasantly surprised to hear from Terri Ingram. He was doubly surprised at what she’d just said.

“A chess piece in the ashtray?”

“Stay with me for a minute on this, G-Man,” the resort owner said and hurriedly continued. “After I left him, Bret let the house go to pot big time. Every dish in the place was caked in crud and stacked in the sink, carpets all filthy, soiled clothes and empty Stoli bottles littered everywhere. You could write sonnets in the dust. And slimy critters evolving in his bathroom. I spent the funeral week literally sterilizing the place, fourteen-hour days of scrubbing it clean kept me moving. Whenever I stopped moving, I’d start sobbing uncontrollably.”

“That’s normal, Terri. You were grieving.”

“I was in a bad state of mind for much of that time after his death, but I didn’t want to take any prescription meds, Valium or anything else to dull the pain. As part of the endless cleaning I threw out all of Bret’s ashtrays, but the one in the back office—right inside from the deck where you and I talked, where the guests come to settle their accounts—I remembered there being some kind of game piece sitting in it, right in the middle of Bret’s spent cigarettes.”

“Do you still have it?”

“That’s what I checked on this morning. You see three years back—on my way to the big dumpster out by the charred remains of the barn—I stopped and tossed the game piece into the game box in the schoolhouse. Do you remember the schoolhouse?”

“Yes,” Cady replied. The schoolhouse, made of plywood, was the size of an equipment shed that sat next to the playground. Little kids could spend the afternoon playing school.

“There’s a wooden box the size of a Navy chest that’s full of plastic toys and dolls and games for the smaller children to play with. Anyway, after our conversation I’ve been doing a lot of thinking and that came back to me early this morning, so I ran out to check. A single chess piece lay in the bottom of the box, even though there’s no matching chess set or board to go with it and there never has been as far as I can tell. I even shouted ‘Bingo!’ and got some strange looks from the morning fishermen.”

“Which chess piece is it, Terri?” Cady asked, feeling his enthusiasm well up from within.

“I’ve never played chess, but it’s one of the small pieces, you know the ones that line the front row—the pawns,” Terri Ingram said. “It’s a single glass pawn.”

“Excellent work, Terri. Excellent. Now listen, don’t touch it and please keep the kids out of the game box. I’ll have an agent there within—”

“I’m already at the airport in Minneapolis, Drew. I’m on the next flight out to D.C.”

“What are you thinking, Terri?” Cady asked. “That chess piece is now part of a criminal investigation.”

“Don’t worry, G-Man. I picked it up with a tweezers and tossed it in a Ziploc—hey, I watch
CSI
. Besides, it’s been in the grime at the bottom of a game box for three years, so I’m not sure what you’ll be able to get off it. I’m bringing it with me. And I’ve also got photocopies of Bret’s original purchase agreement of Sundown Point Resort—and all sorts of interesting paperwork. Turns out he did have a sugar daddy from out east—some entity called The SGL Group.”

“The SGL Group?”

“I don’t do this for a living but I’d hazard a guess that
SGL
stands for
Snow Goose Lake
,” Terri answered. “By the way, Drew, I plan on seeing Dorsey Kelch when I’m out there.”

Cady was disappointed in the direction the conversation had suddenly turned. “I’d strongly advise against doing that, Terri.”

“Whether I get your help or not, Agent Cady,” Terri Ingram responded firmly, “I plan on meeting Dorsey Kelch.”

Chapter 24

“A
fter saving the Kellervick files to a thumb drive,” Agent Preston said while watching Cady, “he apologized profusely for ‘any inconvenience’ to the terrified Mr. Banning and, once again, introduced himself as Special Agent Drew Cady. He then told K&P’s Chief Investment Officer that this was an ‘enhanced interrogation technique’ that the bureau had recently begun to implement.”

Cady shook his head.

“Then he drugged Banning again and dumped the man back in the driveway of his Newton home. Banning awoke about three in the morning, still groggy, and almost had his fourth heart attack in as many hours before it occurred to him that he was inside a car trunk and not a coffin. Anyway, the UNSUB, ever the gentleman, had left the trunk unlatched for the CIO.”

“After all, what’s a little kidnapping, assault with a deadly weapon, and impersonating a federal officer when the bodies are stacking like cordwood?” Assistant Director Jund spoke slowly in a voice just above a whisper that all the federal agents around the conference table strained forward in their seats to hear. “The freak is taunting us now.”

The room fell silent. Cady bit his lower lip and kept quiet. Preston was the SAC—the Special Agent in Charge—and he would show her due deference. Plus, Cady was thankful not to be sitting in Preston’s chair, the hot seat, for this meeting where any new developments lagged far behind the eight ball.

“I had a discussion with Drew before the meeting and he and I are in agreement on three issues,” Preston said, breaking the dead air. “First, the Chessman is alive. Dane Schaeffer and now Bret Ingram have been reclassified as murder victims. In fact, we now know that a glass chess pawn had originally been left at the Ingram murder scene in Cohasset, Minnesota. We’re certain that Ingram ran cover for the Zalentine brothers and, quite likely, Congressman Farris, for their involvement in the death of Marly Kelch at Snow Goose Lake thirteen years ago.”

“
Suggestio falsi
.” The assistant director said to the group as a whole. “
Suppressio veri
.”

“A statement of falsehood to conceal the real truth,” Agent Preston translated aloud.

“A bogus account of events in order to bury the truth,” Cady further translated, “to bury what happened that night at Snow Goose Lake.”

“And for that Bret Ingram was the first in the series of the Chessman murders. The game opened with a pawn, Ingram, being taken out of play even before the queen, K. Barrett Sanfield, which we previously assumed was the first move. Secondly,” Agent Preston continued her narrative, “Drew and I believe that a Chessman copycat is likely responsible for the Gottlieb and Kellervick killings.”

“What’s the intersection between Gottlieb and Kellervick?” the AD asked.

“The only connection we’ve been able to find was that Kellervick attended a conference five years back where Gottlieb was the keynote speaker,” Agent Beth Schommer responded, reading from her legal pad. “But Kellervick’s colleagues who attended the conference with her say they all blew off Gottlieb’s speech and went out for a liquid lunch instead.”

“How do the chess pieces correlate this go-round? Sanfield and Gottlieb both merit a queen, Ingram and Kellervick are pawns?”

“Copycat or not,” said Agent Tom Hiraldi, the chess expert who had also been sucked back into the case, “it’s a new game. Congressman Farris—the king—was lethally checkmated three years ago. Gottlieb starts a new match.”

“What’s your third item, Liz?”

“Drew and I believe the original Chessman has come out of the woodwork to hunt down his own copycat.”

“So we’ve got the original Chessman chasing his own copycat from D.C. to Boston while posing as Special Agent Drew Cady in order to give the bureau the full extension of his middle finger. This is the career equivalent of getting my butt kicked in front of the girls at recess.” Jund closed his eyes as though doing so would make it all go away. “People up the totem pole are monitoring this investigation—actually, excreting bricks would be a more accurate portrayal. I can assure you that the president has his eye on this investigation. I am personally taking a great deal of heat over this investigation. Daily. Volcanic-level heat. And it’s looking more and more like something that fell out of a tall cow’s ass.”

Resounding silence. Any dropped pins went unheard.