A Fatal Frame of Mind

Chapter Eleven

The lemon-poppy seed cake was even better than it looked. The citrus flavor was mild, yet sharp enough to ameliorate the richness of the huge amounts of butter. The black seeds scattered not only on top of the icing but throughout the crumb provided an appealing crunch with every bite.

The only problem with the lemon-poppy seed cake served by the cafe in the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, as far as Gus could see, was that it provided no clue to the whereabouts of Professor Langston Kitteredge.

“Tell me again what we’re doing here.” Gus leaned across the small table until his mouth was almost pressed against Shawn’s ear. “Because there’s no way Professor Kitteredge is going to stop in for a sandwich when every cop north of Los Angeles is hunting for him.”

Shawn ran his fork through the last traces of chocolate icing on his own plate and licked off the tines. “I wouldn’t be so sure,” he said. “It’s a pretty good sandwich. Just look at this place.”

Gus glanced around the room. The cafe was certainly popular. Every table was filled with art lovers here to check out the collection of European paintings, young parents eager to expose their small children to the joys of culture, and tourists determined to see every last attraction in the Santa Barbara area before they headed back to Minneapolis.

Even in this large crowd, however, Gus couldn’t help feeling conspicuous. Because while the room might have been reaching its fire department-sanctioned occupancy limit of one hundred and twenty-nine people, only two men in the entire crowd were wearing tuxedos. And every one of those hundred and twenty-nine had taken a moment to stare at Shawn and Gus as they’d walked past carrying their trays.

“I have been looking at this place almost as much as this place has been looking at me,” Gus said. “It’s hard to be inconspicuous when you’re the only one wearing formal wear in an informal setting.”

“We don’t need to be inconspicuous,” Shawn said. “The police aren’t looking for us. No one is.”

“What about that guy?” Gus said. Across the room, a burly man in a “Ski the Big Potato” T-shirt and khaki shorts that strongly suggested he lived in some area that rarely saw the sun kept looking up from his mousy wife and two squabbling toddlers to stare at them.

Shawn glanced over at the man and saw. Saw the darker tan on his left arm. Saw the way the kids turned only to their mother to plead their case. Saw the faint traces of bruising around his right eye.

“He’s a long-haul trucker,” Shawn said. “Spends twenty-three days of every month on the road, and then he’s forced to go home to that lovely family. His wife made him take them to Santa Barbara on vacation in hopes of bringing the magic back to their marriage, but when they went to the beach he spent the whole time staring at young girls in bikinis, and the missus has been furious with him ever since. Now all he wants is to take the family back to Idaho, get in his rig, and drive as far from home as he can possibly get.”

“You can’t know that,” Gus said.

“Can’t I?” Shawn said.

“No, you can’t,” Gus said.

Shawn cast another glance at the man, who was now glowering openly at them. “Well, there is another possibility,” he said.

“What’s that?”

“That he isn’t a trucker at all,” Shawn said. “And that isn’t really his family. It’s all part of an elaborate cover.”

Gus felt his throat tightening. He knew the answer to his next question, but he couldn’t stop himself from asking it anyway. “Cover for what?”

“For his role in Kitteredge’s conspiracy,” Shawn said. “He knows the professor is going to have to come back here, and he’s waiting to take him out. But he also knows that we’re here to help. And he’s going to do whatever it takes to stop us.”

Gus felt the lemon-poppy seed cake re-forming into a solid slab in his stomach. “Do you really think that’s possible?” he said.

“I don’t know,” Shawn said. “But we can ask him when he gets here.”

Gus looked back over to the trucker’s table. The man was gone. He scanned the room and found him heading straight for their table.

“What do we do?” Gus said.

“The question is, what can he do?” Shawn said. “This is a public place, and we’re surrounded by one hundred and twenty-six other people, not counting the members of his fake family. And statistically, it’s highly unlikely that they’re all members of the conspiracy. If he tries anything, there are going to be lots of witnesses.”

Gus felt a pulse of relief surge through him. “So the only thing he can do is reveal himself to us,” he said.

“Exactly,” Shawn said. “Unless he doesn’t care about his own safety, in which case he could kill us both and then take himself out. That’s the kind of thing crazed conspirators do, isn’t it?”

Gus could have sworn he’d eaten only one piece of that cake. But now it felt like there was an entire bakery’s worth hardening in his gut. He thought about jumping up from the table and running for the exit, but if this man really was a crazed killer sent by the conspiracy, there was no chance he’d be able to get away. Not if the assassin didn’t care about his own life.

There was only one chance-to stay and fight. He slid his hand onto the tabletop and felt for the knife he’d put on the tray out of habit as they went through the serving line. The blade flexed under his fingers-it was made of thin white plastic, and it would snap in two if it ever hit the slightest obstacle, like a piece of lettuce. But Gus knew from painful experience that when it did break, the larger piece would have a jagged point. It couldn’t possibly penetrate anything harder than pudding, but Gus could always aim for the killer’s eyes and hope at least to cause the same level of pain as a piece of dust on the eyeball.

As Gus tightened his grip on his weapon, the man stepped up to their table and glowered down at them.

“It’s over,” he said in a voice filled with menace.

“On the contrary,” Shawn said. “I think it’s just beginning.”

“I’ve been watching you for a long time,” the man said.

“Since last night?” Gus said, trying to inject a little steel into his voice. “Or before? Did you start when Professor Kitteredge sent that letter? Or have you been watching since I first took his class?”

The man’s brow furled in confusion. “I’ve been watching you two lazy jerks sitting here for twenty minutes while my wife and kids have been waiting for someone to take their order. Or even give us a menu. A break’s nice, but you’ve got customers waiting, and we’re hungry.”

Gus tried to understand what the man was talking about. Was this some kind of code? When he talked about his wife and kids waiting for someone to take their order, did he really mean he was holding off any action until his superiors in the conspiracy told him what to do?

He glanced over to see if Shawn had any idea what was going on. And then he understood. When they’d arrived at the gala function in their tuxedos last night, they looked like elegant gentlemen of breeding. In the light of day and surrounded by tourists in T-shirts and shorts, they looked like something else.

“There is no table service here,” Gus said. “It’s self-serve. Didn’t you see the line of people standing at the counter carrying trays?”

The conspiracy’s undercover agent did the last thing Gus would ever have expected. He blushed. “That’s what I told the missus,” he said. “But she said if there were waiters here, there must be service as well. And you don’t know my missus, but she’s not one to accept second class when someone else is getting first.”

“Sorry to disappoint you,” Shawn said.

“Not me,” the man said. “I don’t mind waiting in line. But my wife-she hates it when she thinks other people have it better than her. Like when we were in that gallery with all the paintings and all we had to explain it was that prerecorded thing. Sorry I bothered you two.”

“No bother at all,” Gus said, feeling the cake dissolve again in his gut.

“Guess I’ll go wait in line,” the man said. “Unless…”

“Unless what?” Gus said.

The man stared down at his sandals in embarrassment. “Well, I was thinking maybe I could slip you some money and you could get some food and bring it over to us. I know it’s a big thing to ask, but it would make my wife awfully happy.”

“I wish we could help,” Gus said. “But we’re here-”

“To be of service to our fellow man,” Shawn said. “That’s why we’re dressed like this.”

“It is?” Gus said.

“Give us your order, and my friend here will bring it over to your table,” Shawn said.

Gus stared at Shawn, trying to figure out what he was doing. “I will?” he said.

“You will,” Shawn said. “Because this nice family has suffered enough today. Like when they were back in that gallery and all they had to explain the paintings was that prerecorded thing.”

“That’s right,” the man said.

“When there were other people in the gallery who didn’t pay anything more than you did who not only had the prerecorded tour, but also got a personal introduction to every painting in the room.”

“That’s right,” the man said. “It wasn’t like he was leading a tour or anything. There were these people looking at a painting right next to us and this giant tweedy guy came up to them and started talking about the guy who did it and where he was born and what kind of paint he used.”

Now Gus understood what Shawn was after. “And did he stop talking?” he asked.

“Not as long as we were in that room,” the man said. “Honestly, I don’t know why the missus cared so much. At least the recorded thing runs out of batteries at some point. This guy was never going to.”

“We’ll get your food,” Shawn said. “But then we need you to tell us exactly where you saw this man.”