Cold Case

1

Maybe the cab was an extravagance. We didn’t have a client, and my boss, the great Lucullus Marten, might decide I was wasting his money. On the other hand, my feet were aching, and I could prop them up on the jump seat of the big, roomy Checker cab. People call me Marten’s legman, and maybe they’re right. Mainly, what I do is a lot of footwork, and that’s what I was doing right now — checking libraries to find a copy of the Social Register, walking over to the offices of the New York Chronicle to read back files on the Van Alst family…and to check for any unpublished poop on the Van Alst murder.

Pamela Van Alst had been in Marten’s office just days before, brought in by a friend who didn’t like the crowd the poor little rich girl was running with. Marten doesn’t like young females. He growled at her. Pamela didn’t like opinionated detective geniuses who need a special chair to hold their oversized bulk. She left. Then she turned up dead last night. It was a particularly ugly way to go — she’d been dragged down a country road.

The killing had finally stirred Marten off his big, fat…laurels. Taking the murder as a personal insult, he’d sent me out to gather, as he put it, “the relevant information.”

That’s the Lucullus Marten method of cracking a case. He stays in the slightly drafty, gray stone mansion way west on Seventy-second Street, eating gourmet meals, drinking at least seven bottles of sparkling cider a day, and tending his world-class crop of cacti on the top floor. His trusty legman, Monty Newman — that’s me — goes forth to track down facts, ask questions, and annoy suspects.

I report. He stores the info in a brain at least as massive as the rest of him, and comes up with solutions to the knottiest mysteries.

Unfortunately, the information I was coming home with, while relevant, wasn’t very helpful. I could have dug much the same facts out of the newspaper coverage. And, thanks to the wealthy Van Alsts putting up an enormous reward to find the murderer of their beloved daughter, I’d already encountered several other investigators pushing into the case.

Simply put, the facts were as follows: The deceased had been found on a back road of Alstenburgh, an upstate town where the elite meet to raise property values. The discoverer had been a dairy farmer rushing his milk to market.

Pamela Van Alst had last been seen in the company of Woodrow Peyton, eldest son of a political dynasty. The Peytons had provided the nation with several senators and would-be presidents. Young Woodrow spent his time in Alstenburgh, Albany, Washington…and, often enough, on the more easygoing streets of Manhattan.

Society pages described him as “a young man-about-town.” Newspapers are wary of libel suits. However, when I asked, the staffs of selected hotels, restaurants, and nightclubs called Woodie Peyton a bum — but a bum with a whole lot of money behind him.

I could have figured as much from the rather careful way he was treated in the front-page news stories. So I’m afraid I had more weeds than flowers in the bouquet I was bringing back to Marten.

I stepped from the cab, carefully jotting the fare down in my notebook, and started for the iron-railinged steps of the house I know best in this city.

Then I noticed the beefy character coming out of a parked car, heading my way, and reaching into the light topcoat he wore against the late fall chill.

My own hand slipped under my jacket. I’d learned long ago that murder cases can turn quite unexpectedly ugly. A little artillery can go a long way in meeting some of those surprises.

The beefy man’s meaty fingers emerged with nothing more deadly than a leather case, flashing a badge and an identification card. I hadn’t pegged him as a member of the local law, and he wasn’t. The ID was federal. I had a genuine G-man keeping me from the comforts of home.

“You’re Monty Newman,” he announced.

I shook my head in wonder. “The government’s always right.”

The beefy features contracted into a look that was supposed to scare me. “Let’s say the government keeps an eye open for potential troublemakers. You’ve spent the day asking prying questions about some very important people.”

“I wasn’t aware that was against federal law,” I said. “No state secrets were revealed, and none of us discussed overthrowing the established order. We’re all waiting to see how the next elections work out.”

“Very funny.” The G-man sounded as if he’d been told humor was unpatriotic. “But certain people won’t be laughing.”

“Well, you certainly aren’t,” I had to agree. “I thought they’d managed to weed all you patronage types out of the feds. Certain people might frown on an officer running political errands, Agent Olin.”

I’d already gotten his name when he flashed his credentials. Quick eyes were part of my job. The rest is just the way I am. When somebody pushes, I like to shove right back.

Olin twisted his face out of its previous unpleasant expression into an equally unpleasant sneer. “I don’t think you’ll get far — trying that, or staying on the Van Alst case.”

Whoever he had behind him, Olin obviously thought he had ironclad protection. He had also decided not to waste any more time on me. “Remember what I told you…and pass it along to that fat freak inside.”

I turned my back on this representative of the power and majesty of the law.

“Oh, count on it,” I told him. “But I’ll give you fair warning. You might need reinforcements if you’re hoping to budge Lucullus Marten.”

As the town house door swung closed behind Monty Newman, Matt Hunter disengaged from the computer program. He blinked for a moment, lying back in his computer-link couch. It took a little while to recover from the differences between the created world of the simulation and everyday reality. The sim was set in 1930s Manhattan — far away in time and space from the Washington, D.C., of 2025.

His room was a lot colder than the late fall chill of the sim. He’d left his window open, and the winter breeze coming in was downright freezing. The capital was in the grip of a cold spell. Forecasters were predicting snow, something that D.C. usually handled badly during its rare appearances.

Matt fought back a shiver as he went to shut the window. His jeans and long-sleeved T-shirt were much lighter than Monty Newman’s snazzy wool suit. Right now, he wouldn’t even have minded wearing the unpleasant Agent Olin’s topcoat.

Matt’s usually cheerful face set in a frown at the thought of a federal agent being set up as his opponent — maybe even as a bad guy — in the sim. He knew several FBI people — specifically the special agents assigned to keep the country’s computer networks free of criminals. Olin was nothing like the Net Force agents Matt had encountered.

The sound of a HoloNews broadcast filtering through the door of his room sent Matt glancing at the clock on the wall. His breath hissed through his teeth. I was in longer than I should have been, he thought. Mom and Dad are home already. I’ll really have to blow through my homework and supper if I want to hit the Net Force Explorers meeting tonight.

Leif Anderson sighed. Whenever I come early to a meeting, I always wind up regretting it. He glanced around the featureless government-issue meeting space. As virtual constructs went, it was pretty basic — just a place to pop up after you’d synched in to your computer and given the address for the monthly meeting of the Net Force Explorers. It did have one nice touch — the meeting room always managed to grow seamlessly as more and more members turned up from all over the country. But other than that the scenery was strictly low rent. Still, he’d hoped to show up early, run into a few of his friends, and spend some time happily shooting the breeze with them. Things hadn’t exactly worked out that way.

Actually, Leif had really just wanted to get out of the condo his family used as home base when they were in Washington. It was okay when he came down with his father to do some deals in the capital. But this time around, his mom was in the condo, too…and there just didn’t seem to be enough room for all of them. Usually, Natalya Anderson stayed in New York when Dad had business in D.C. Or she went to London, Paris, St. Petersburg — wherever the dance world had a major outpost.

Her interest in dance wasn’t surprising. After all, before Leif was born, she’d risen to stardom as Natalya Ivanova, dancing with one of the world’s best ballet companies. This week she was in Washington to see students performing for a local troupe. No stars, no big names…most likely none of these dancers was ever going to make it to any of the leading companies. But the choreographer for the troupe was one of Mom’s old dancing partners, and he was premiering a new piece. As a consequence, Leif’s mom was taking this very personally.

Before she left for the performance, if the state of her nerves was anything to go by, Leif would have thought his mom would be out there dancing herself instead of sitting in the audience. A little distance from the rare appearance of his mom in prima donna mode had seemed advisable.

Leif had finally fled to his computer, heading early to the Net Force Explorers meeting…and a little peace.

He hadn’t gotten any, though. The first person to arrive had been Megan O’Malley. “You made the society news today,” she announced. “Nice picture of you and your folks arriving in town.”

She gave him a piercing look. “I’ve always suspected you edited your Net image. The holo showed a real-life zit on your chin.”

Things rapidly went downhill from there. Leif couldn’t understand it. He liked Megan. She was attractive, smart, a little sharp-tongued, but then, so was he. He’d missed her over the winter holidays. Instead of getting down to D.C., as he usually did, he’d been drafted for some social duty by his father and had been forced to stay in New York. Magnus Anderson had been forging a business alliance with Hardaway Industries, and Leif had been stuck as the holiday escort for Courtney Hardaway.

In a word, it had been disastrous. Leif had found himself comparing Courtney to Megan — sort of like trying to compare a spoiled and yapping miniature poodle to a playful but possibly lethal Doberman. Courtney was all facade — pleasant to Leif when their parents were around but miserably stuck-up otherwise. During their first moments alone, she’d let Leif know that she considered him way beneath her notice, hopelessly outclassed.

After all, Leif’s dad was the one who’d amassed the Anderson family fortune, not some long-forgotten distant ancestor. That made Leif a social climber.

Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations, Leif thought. My generation is supposed to be the one that blows the money.

On the other hand, the Hardaways had held on to their family loot for more than four generations…not counting the current influx of cash on its way from Anderson Investments Multinational.

The deal was now done, and Leif had been glad to get down to Washington. He’d even had hopes of actually meeting Megan someplace outside of veeyar — until she had popped up at this meeting and begun serving him hot-and-cold running attitude.

Apparently, he was the snob for not getting in touch with her over the holidays. One word led to another, until now they were down to the third-grade level — the “Did not!”/“Did too!” stage of the argument.

Leif never expected to be happy to see Andy Moore turn up. The crew’s jokester usually managed to annoy Leif as often as he entertained him. But at least Andy diverted some of Megan’s bad temper today.

David Gray was the next to link in. He was the calm, scientific member of the group. Leif had noticed that lately his friend looked happier in veeyar than in person. David’s real-life self was currently hobbling around on a cane, thanks to a broken leg — a nasty souvenir from a recent adventure. The virtual David stepped lively to pull Leif away from the throng while Andy teased Megan into a murderous fury.

“What’s going on with O’Malley?” Leif asked. “She just about bit my head off when I arrived.”

“I hear she’s angry with the world right now,” David said quietly. “Especially with anyone she suspects of owning his own tuxedo.”

Leif stared. “What?”

“This guy asked Megan to the Winter Formal — a Leet.”

Even though he didn’t go to Bradford Academy, Leif recognized the school slang. The Leets were the elite — the social in-crowd. Bradford was a good school that attracted students from the families of the wealthy, the politically powerful, and from Washington’s diplomatic community. The date — especially for a Bradford formal dance — would have been a big deal for Megan. “What happened?”

“Guy blew her off at the last minute. His folks hooked him up with this other girl…from their circle.” David’s face looked as if he’d detected a bad smell.

“Megan got stuck with a gown?”

David nodded. “And no date. Moore wound up taking her — in this awful rented tux that he thought was a clever joke and Megan thought was the most embarrassing thing she’d ever laid eyes on. The Leet who’d started the whole mess snubbed her publicly at the dance, and nasty rumors about why he did that started flying all over school the next day.”

“Oh.” Now Leif was glad he hadn’t explained why he hadn’t exactly been available over the holidays. Talk about pouring oil on the fires…

“Why, here’s another hero deciding to grace us with his appearance,” Megan said sourly as Matt Hunter popped into existence beside them.

Matt half-turned. “I can always go,” he said.

“What? And leave us alone with her?” Andy dropped to his knees, his hands up in a begging gesture. “No! Pleeeeeease!” Megan looked about ready to cut him down to that size permanently — and she had the martial-arts know-how to do it, too.

Matt made an attempt to head off any bloodshed. “Hey, I’m sorry if I haven’t been around much lately. I got wrapped up in this really cool sim.”

Arguments were forgotten as everybody clustered around. The Net — with all its possibilities and opportunities to have fun — was the reason these kids had joined the Net Force Explorers. If one member of the crew happened onto something good, the others all wanted in on it.

“I hope this is better than that kayaking-down-the-Matterhorn sim that Andy turned up,” Megan growled.

“Not quite as death-defying,” Matt admitted. “It’s a mystery sim.”

“So what’s the big deal?” Maj Green, who’d somehow managed to synch in unnoticed, wanted to know. “You can find them everywhere. There’s a million and three commercial sites offering interactive investigations.”

“This sim is different,” Matt insisted. “It’s not one of those big-business, one-size-fits-all setups. One guy programmed it, and he’s running it single-handed.”

“A boutique sim,” Megan sniffed. “That means rip-off rates — or are you beta-testing for this guy?”

“Neither,” Matt said. “Ed Saunders is a mystery buff. This is his first shot. And it’s a real labor of love.” He grinned. “There’s a whole bunch of detectives who are competing to solve the case, and if you read a lot of classic mysteries, you’ll recognize them.”

“Homage,” Leif said.

“Plagiarism,” Megan contradicted. “I hope this clown isn’t using any of my dad’s characters.” Her father was a well-known author of mystery novels.

“That reminds me,” Leif said. “I picked up your father’s latest. Is he really going to go through with a title for every letter in the alphabet with this character?”

“What?” Megan demanded. “You don’t think he’ll last long enough to make it all the way through?”

“I thought somebody else had used that gimmick.” Andy ducked as Megan swung round at him.

“Gimmick?” she said. “You think my father relies on gimmicks to sell his work?”

“Let’s just hope he gets up to X,” David said. “I want to see what he uses for the title.”

“About this sim. Can we check it out?” Maj asked.

“I don’t know,” Matt replied. “I think Ed has all the sleuths set up.”

“‘Sleuths,’” Megan mocked.

“Well, it’s set in the 1930s,” Matt quickly explained. “Although I think some of the detectives may come from later eras.”

“Maybe there are openings for bit players,” David suggested. “Like cops.” His father was a homicide investigator for the D.C. police.

“Or stool pigeons,” Megan said, hooking a thumb at Andy Moore.

“I’ll check with Ed,” Matt promised. He had no chance to say more. While he and his friends had been talking, quite a crowd had gathered in the virtual meeting room. Now one wall vanished to reveal a small stage with a military-looking figure standing on it.

Even though he was now a civilian working for Net Force, one glance at Captain James Winters said “Marine.” He faced the Net Force Explorers in a relaxed parade rest, his hands clasped behind his back as he gave his usual opening. “Welcome to the national meeting of the Net Force Explorers.”

The captain smiled. “I’m happy to say I have nothing of particularly earth-shaking importance to report today. The Net is running as smoothly as we could hope. No emergencies or baffling mysteries.”

As he spoke, Winters glanced over to where Matt and his friends stood. Matt sort of ducked his head. Well, they did have something of a reputation for leaping into Net Force cases. With nothing going on, at least that wasn’t likely to happen this time around.

“This year marks the FBI’s ninetieth birthday,” Winters went on. “Although the Justice Department has had investigators since 1908, we didn’t officially become the Federal Bureau of Investigation until July 1, 1935.

“To mark the anniversary, the Bureau is setting up some historical simulations. The first of them opens this week, commemorating the antigangster successes of the 1930s.”

“The glory days of the G-men,” Megan muttered. “Before the first director gave in to megalomania.”

Matt couldn’t help contrasting Captain Winters with the nasty, fleshy virtual G-man he’d encountered in Ed Saunders’s sim. Even J. Edgar Hoover hadn’t been that ugly. I really have to have a little talk with Ed about his FBI agent, he told himself. The sooner, the better.