The Surrogate Thief

Chapter 24

Joe, come down to the basement," Sammie's voice told him on the phone. "You're going to want to see this. Better make it quick."

He was about to ask her why when the phone went dead in his hand-her subtle way of forcing the issue.

He sighed and rose from his desk, half expecting to hear roots tearing away from the chair seat. He'd been spending so much time here, endlessly going over the same documents and photographs, that he was starting to believe the rumors that he was going around the bend.

He didn't think he was obsessing, though. He'd been in regular touch with Kathy Bartlett, checking her progress on what they were now both calling her "modern" case, versus his "ancient" one. And despite her many inroads and a file the size of a small clothes closet, she still didn't have the highly vaunted and much desired smoking gun of legal lore. Hers remained a circumstantial case, if, admittedly, a strengthening one.

And he remained convinced that the key to it all lay in his dusty collection of old memories and artifacts.

He reached the basement two minutes later to find most of the people present clustered around the TV mounted in one corner of the room.

To his surprise, on the screen he saw Gail working her way through a throng in what looked like a town hall.

"What's going on?" he asked Sammie, feeling awkwardly out of touch.

"Apparently, earlier today, Susan Raffner held a press conference on her own. She said she was breaking with the campaign and had handed in her resignation as manager to ask the question no one was willing to ask: What does Ed Parker know about Tom Bander's criminal activities and when did he know it? Quite the bombshell for a Podunk, Vermont, election."

"I didn't hear anything about this," he said, immediately regretting how inane that sounded.

But Sam didn't notice. Her eyes still on the TV, she said, "None of us did. We only turned this thing on because someone walked in and said he'd heard something was about to happen."

On-screen, Gail reached a small podium equipped with a couple of microphones. "It is with regret," she began, "that I have had to accept the resignation of my campaign manager and friend, Susan Raffner, for some unfounded and unsubstantiated comments she made earlier today. My regret comes, it should be noted, not because I am losing a trusted advisor, but because she let the goal of winning override both her judgment and the whole point of the political process, which is to allow voters to choose between two candidates in a fair, impartial, and unsensationalistic setting. What she implied about my political opponent, Ed Parker, has, to the best of my knowledge, no basis in fact, and had she not resigned, I would have asked her to do so. Such comments represent to me all that politics should not be about in this country, and although her departure from my staff will no doubt dishearten my supporters at exactly the point when I would prefer them to be carrying my message all the way to election day, I would like to stress here that what has happened today is precisely why I should be sent to the state senate.

"Too often in this country, we have seen our political leaders tout loyalty to their friends and backers over the interests of the people. They have, time and again, retreated to their support base like cowards unsure of the hearts and minds of the very people who elected them. Democrats and Republicans alike have ducked responsibility, orchestrated cover-ups, and flat-out lied on national television, all in the wrongheaded and insulting belief that we who elected them would somehow swallow their baloney solely because they told us to.

"Well," she added, grabbing the edge of the podium with both hands and leaning forward for emphasis, "I won't have any of it. I will fire people who aren't honest. I will fire people who play politics. And I will do so regardless of the supposed fallout that comes from having integrity. I will never believe that good people finish last, and I will never believe that the voters of this county, of this state, and of this country will allow themselves to be hoodwinked and misled by a political status quo that's been doing the same thing for so long, they've come to see it as the truth. Politics for the sake of politics is a sham and a lie, and I won't have anything to do with it. Thank you."

They watched as she pulled away from the podium amid a chorus of ignored questions, and retreated the way she'd come. As someone turned down the sound on the TV set, Joe heard Sammie murmur, "You go, girl."

As a growing number of faces turned his way inquiringly, imitating Gail, he quickly made his escape.

"Some speech."

Joe looked up. Standing in the office doorway was Tony Brandt, looking, as usual, slightly bemused. Of all the people who might have crossed Joe's threshold right now, he was happy Brandt was the first. It was going to take some getting used to, being the shadowy companion of the latest political fireworks display, and he didn't relish the predictable attention. Sure as hell, he wasn't going home tonight. Nor would he be going to Gail's, although he'd already left a message for her to call him when she could.

"What did you think?" he asked noncommittally, indicating a chair for Tony to sit in.

"I think," his old boss said, settling in, "that we all just witnessed the Hail Mary pass to end all. If it works the way I think it will, it'll put her at the top of the very political game she was claiming to debunk."

Joe felt his spirits almost palpably sag. "That cynical?"

Tony raised one shoulder. "Maybe that idealistic and practical. It depends on whose side you're on, as usual. Me? I think it was a master stroke, but then, I've always admired the lady."

Joe went to what he felt was the most telling point of the question. "Do you think she and Susan cooked it up together?"

Tony smiled. "Joe, you know her better than anyone. You've loved her, lived with her, nursed her back to health. Hell, you almost died for her, indirectly. With that degree of familiarity, you're asking me?"

Joe didn't smile back. "Yes. I am."

Tony became serious. "No, I don't. Because Gail Zigman's not the only one we're talking about here. Susan Raffner is about as tough-minded as any man or woman I've ever met. I don't know what Gail might say if she were asked the same question because, despite her statement on TV, she's as loyal a friend as anyone could want. But I would bet my bottom dollar that Susan launched this boat all on her own, trusting Gail would have the intelligence-and the heart," he added emphatically, "to know what to do next. That's why I said earlier that this smacks more of idealism than cynicism."

He paused, looked at Joe quietly for a moment, and finally added, "But that's me."

"No," Joe conceded. "That's you and me. Nice to hear, though."

Tony chuckled half to himself and got to his feet, dispelling the tension. "You have to admit, though, if she was in a horse race before, Christ only knows what it's turned into now."

He walked to the door, paused, and repeated, "Hell of a speech. See ya, Joe."

Joe sat there for a while, thinking, retracing the conversation. There'd been something in its midst, totally unrelated, that had struck him, as occasional stray thoughts do, out of the blue, encouraged by the merest turn of phrase.

He swiveled in his seat and stared out the window, letting his mind drift. When it finally came to him, he could only admire the simplicity of it.

Shaking his head, he reached for the phone and dialed the crime lab again.

"David?" he said, once the lab director had picked up. "Can you do me another favor?"

With nothing more to go on than pure instinct, he knew he'd found the proverbial smoking gun.

Kathy Bartlett looked up as Gunther knocked on her open door.

"Joe," she said. "What're you doing in town? Have a seat."

"I was in Waterbury, picking up something from David Hawke," he said, sitting opposite her and placing a manila envelope on her desk.

She reached for it but didn't open it immediately. "My God, Gail sure has been making the news."

He smiled ruefully, knowing Kathy's politics were at odds with Gail's on most matters. "Yeah. It's a crapshoot now."

"I give her high marks for guts, though. The woman knows how to fight. If I lived down that way, I might reconsider my vote." She hefted the thin envelope. "What's this?"

"I think it may be what you've been looking for," he told her, happy to move off a subject that had been filling the air ever since Gail's announcement. He and Gail had spoken just once thereafter, mostly for him to wish her luck and for both of them to agree to stay out of each other's way, for everyone's sake. It had been a practical, forlorn conversation. "I was having a chat with Tony Brandt a few days ago, in part about knowing people and things so well and so intimately, that a sudden surprise no longer seems possible. Made me rethink how I'd been looking at the Oberfeldt case."

"Oh?" she prompted, still holding the envelope. Like the prosecutor she was, she knew the value of occasional patience.

"The switchblade at the scene bugged me from the start," he explained. "It wasn't used, although it was open, and the thumbprint on it pointed directly to Pete Shea-which, as it turned out, was the intention."

"The surrogate thief," Kathy said with a smile.

"Right-and eventually the surrogate killer. The gun planted under Shea's mattress was clearly supposed to be the deal closer-no prints, but still covered with Oberfeldt's blood. Of course, Shea found it before we got a lead on him, had his girlfriend hide it, and beat feet, in short order. But the plan worked anyway-we believed Pete was Oberfeldt's killer."

"Okay," Kathy said neutrally.

"If you're going to set someone up like that, you do the deed and then plant the evidence. Makes sense. But as Ralpher or Bander or whatever you want to call him was putting the old man into a coma, Oberfeldt got one good shot at him, maybe with his elbow, and hit him square in the nose-produced a real gusher.

"Following my conversation with Tony, I replayed that scene in my head, based on no more than what I would've done in Bander's place. I visualized tossing aside the gun I'd used to beat Oberfeldt, feeling my nose to assess the damage-and thus covering my hand with my own blood-and then extracting the switchblade to place it by the body."

Kathy's eyes narrowed as she now tore open the envelope. "You're kidding me," she said. "Bander's blood is on the switchblade along with Oberfeldt's?"

Joe smiled. "Exactly. I had the crime lab test the knife from end to end. Before, reasonably enough-especially for back then-they'd taken but one small sample, which turned out to be only the victim's. Pure dumb luck."

Kathy scanned the printed results before her. "There's no such thing, Joe-it's all part of the cosmic plan." She looked up at him. "Especially when it works in your favor."

She rose and shook his hand, a rare gesture for her. "I'll have an arrest warrant for Thomas Bander in a few hours. You want to be the one to serve it?"