Counterplay

13

The twenty-something arab-american bicycle messenger rode briskly down Crosby, hopped the curb up onto the sidewalk, and came to a stop at the old brick building on the corner with Grand. He dismounted, leaned his bicycle against a railing, and walked up the small flight of stairs to the security door where he pressed the buzzer and waited.

A young boy’s voice answered over the intercom. “Yes?”

“I have a package for Roger Karp,” the messenger said. Oh no, a kid. They can take forever, and there ain’t going to be no tip. He had plans to go out dancing that night with some of his fellow NYU students and was already running behind on his deliveries. He leaned toward the intercom. “Uh, kid, you don’t have to sign for it. I can leave it right here, and you can get it when you want.”

“Sure,” the boy said. “I’ll be down in a couple minutes.”

The messenger put the box down on the doorstep and turned to leave. He didn’t get far as he was surrounded by three men-one in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, another in a business suit straight off the rack, and the third in dreadlocks, and all of them pointing guns at him.

“Police! Get your frickin’ hands in the air,” the one in jeans and a pullover sweatshirt yelled. He waved something that looked like a badge. “Step away from the door and walk slowly toward me…. Don’t drop your hands or I’m going to put a hot one in your frickin’ head.”

“Don’t shoot!” the terrified young man shouted. “I’m just a bike guy!” He hurried to the bottom of the stairs, where he was instructed to lie on the ground with his arms extended above his head. The cop in the cheap business suit stepped forward and frisked him from head to toe, then ordered him to roll over-“keeping your fuggin’ hands where we can see them if you don’t want to get shot”-and frisked him again.

“He’s clean,” the frisker yelled and stepped back with his gun still trained on the young man. “Okay, get up.”

The young man did as told and was escorted by the arm across the street from the entrance to the Karp family’s loft. “Of course, I’m clean,” the messenger complained as they walked, regaining some of his courage now that he realized that his assailants really were cops and he probably wasn’t going to get shot. “What’s the matter, you see an Arab guy these days, you take him down?”

The cop ignored him. “What’s in the package?”

“How the hell should I know? I’m just a delivery guy for Manhattan Bicycle Services,” he replied. “They give me shit. I take it where I’m supposed to. If they don’t need a signature and the person isn’t there or tells me I can go, I just leave it.”

As he was talking, two more men came running up. They were wearing New York City Public Works Department jumpsuits, but they looked more like businessmen dressing up for Halloween than men who made a living with their hands. For one thing, their fingernails were clean and there wasn’t a spot on the twin aviator sunglasses they wore.

“Nice of you guys to show up,” the cop in the sweatshirt said.

“We figured you NYPD guys might be able to handle one kid,” one of the federal agents from Homeland Security shot back. “We were watching the street to make sure nothing else was on the way while you three were distracted. So what’s this guy’s story?”

“Bicycle messenger dropping off a package,” the third cop, a black man with the dreadlocks and a Bob Marley Lives T-shirt, said.

“If you’re going to jump on every bicycle messenger in town who comes by, you might want to call in more help,” the agent said with a smirk.

“Maybe we should, if it’s going to take you two such a long time to put down your Starbucks coffees and get your fat asses back out on the streets,” sweatshirt cop replied. “We were told all packages, whether they’re from the post office or FedEx, whatever, were being held for inspection before delivery by one of our guys. So this guy comes wheeling up at a hundred miles an hour and drops off a package without giving it to nobody, you bet we’re going to err on the side of caution.”

Business suit cop, who had been speaking into his radio, turned to the others and said, “The guy checks out. He’s been working for the messenger service for two years.”

“They were profiling, is what they were doing. Violating my constitutional rights,” the bicycle messenger said to the federal agents, having decided that the guys with the public works department were on his side. “See an Arab and down comes the law, right?”

Sweatshirt cop, whose face looked like he might have once fought for a living, glared at the messenger. “Don’t you have someplace you need to be?”

The messenger got the hint and went back across the street and retrieved his bicycle. As he pedaled off, he raised his right hand and extended the middle-fingered salute. “Fuckin’ racists!” he yelled over his shoulder.

Sweatshirt cop was about to yell something back when the door across the way opened and two boys appeared, saw the box, and were about to pick it up. “DON’T TOUCH THE FRICKIN’ PACKAGE!” the cops all shouted at once.

The boys stopped in their tracks, looked at each other and then, skirting around the package, jumped down the stairs, and bounded across the street to the cops. “Is it a bomb? Is it a bomb?” the Karp twins, Giancarlo and Zak, shouted with excitement.

“Mom and I told you the public works department guys were the feds,” Giancarlo yelled in triumph at his brother.

“Doesn’t mean the guys selling the purses on the sidewalk aren’t feds,” Zak replied hotly. “They’ve been watching us every day, too.”

“Maybe they’re the terrorists,” Giancarlo suggested.

“One of ’em’s got blue eyes,” Zak pointed out.

“Lots of Muslims have blue eyes, especially if they’re from Persia. There’s a lot of Slav and Thracian-you know, Thracian like Alexander the Great-influences in the population. But they’re Muslim now.”

The cops listened as the boys debated whether they had terrorists eyeing their apartment like they were debating the Yankees’ chances of winning the World Series. “Is it a bomb?” the twins repeated. “And did you catch the guy who left it?”

“We don’t know what it is, so we want to play it safe for the moment,” sweatshirt cop said. “The guy who brought it was just a bicycle messenger. He doesn’t know what’s in the box.”

“That’s what he says,” said Zak, who had always been more given to intrigue and danger than his brother. “Maybe you should have tortured him a bit and squeezed the truth out of him.”

“Would you suggest I rip out his fingernails or break every bone in his body?” sweatshirt cop asked, smiling.

“Both,” Zak replied but further comment was stifled by the deep-throated bark of a large dog. They all turned to see Marlene Ciampi exiting the building behind them where, the cops knew, she had an art studio on the top floor. She was accompanied by the biggest dog any of them had ever seen.

As she approached, Marlene noticed the men, especially the presumed federal agents who’d had no contact yet with Gilgamesh, glancing nervously at the dog. “It’s okay,” she said, “he’s friendly, unless I tell him not to be.” As if to prove her right, the animal licked enthusiastically at their outstretched hands and rubbed up against their legs to beg for scratches and pats. “You want to tell me what’s going on?”

“Oh, uh, sure, Mrs. Ciampi,” sweatshirt cop said. “We just saw a guy dropping off an unscheduled package across the street and we were checking him out.”

Marlene turned and started walking across the street toward the package, but the officer asked her to stop. “Sorry,” he said. “I know it’s probably okay, but I’d like to call in the bomb squad just in case.”

Marlene looked back over her shoulder at him. “That’s okay, officer, Gilgamesh, my dog, is certified in bomb detection. I’ll have him take a whiff and save your guys the trouble.” She continued across the street.

Gilgamesh gave the box a cursory sniff, turned a bored expression to Marlene, then walked back to the curb where he barked at the twins who were still standing across the street. He was ready for a romp and wanted to know what they were waiting for.

“Nothing to worry about,” Marlene shouted as a dark Lincoln pulled up. Her husband and Special-Agent-in-Charge Espey Jaxon got out.

After she explained what had occurred, Jaxon knelt down by the box. “There’s no return address,” he said. “The shipping label isn’t complete either; there’s nothing under sender.”

Business suit cop walked over and said, “The messenger company says it received the package from Denver, Colorado-no return address and the bill was paid in cash.”

Jaxon took a pen from his coat pocket and inserted it into a flap to pick up the box. “We’ll send this back to the folks at Quantico,” he said, referring to the FBI’s crime lab in Virginia. “But let’s see if we can get a peek first at what’s inside.”

Karp, Marlene, Espey, the two twelve-year-old boys, and one disappointed dog entered the building and crowded onto the elevator that took them up to the landing outside the door of the loft. Inside, Jaxon placed the box on the dining room table as they all gathered around to watch.

Using a borrowed pair of tweezers and his pocket knife, the agent carefully opened the package without touching it to avoid messing up any fingerprints, even though it had already been handled by who knew how many people in transit. Once he had the box unsealed, he began removing the contents. First, he took out the packing material-handfuls of newspaper shredded into spaghetti-thin strips-which he placed in a plastic zip-lock bag Marlene got from the kitchen.

A folded notecard emerged with the second handful of shreds. Using the tweezers, Jaxon opened the card, which he read aloud. “It says, ‘I hope you didn’t shoot the messenger. Your move.’ ”

“This is soooo cool. Secret messages,” Zak said as his parents rolled their eyes at their adrenaline junkie son.

Jaxon peered inside the box and then tipped it on end so that a small white object tumbled out.

“A bishop,” Karp noted of the chess piece that lay on its side on the table. He didn’t need V.T. to tell him that it was a Carlos Torres; the detail was exquisite and the inset jewels had to be worth his annual salary.

“Awesome,” Giancarlo, the chess player in the bunch, said and reached for the piece only to have his mother, who’d anticipated his avarice, smack his hand.

“Don’t touch, buster,” she growled looking at Giancarlo but also turning her glare on Zak, who had a tendency to believe that warnings given to others didn’t necessarily include himself.

Jaxon took out a handkerchief and touching as little of the chess piece as possible, dropped it into another zip-lock baggie. “Looks expensive. Neither of you ordered it, right?”

Marlene shook her head. But Karp said, “It’s carved by a guy named Torres. Apparently, it is very, very expensive and each piece is hand carved.” He explained how he had come by his sudden knowledge. He bit his lip before adding, “I think we’re being told that Kane has selected another target.”

“You think Kane sent this to you?” Jaxon asked.

Karp nodded. “Yeah, it’s looking that way.” He told them about the two black chess pieces that had been found in his office. “First, I thought it might be a couple of my guys misplaced them. Then I asked my receptionist about it. She said they’d appeared on her desk on two different mornings and, thinking the same thing I did, put them in my office so they could be given back to their rightful owner.”

“She working for Kane, too, maybe?” Jaxon said.

“Nah, if she’s anything more than she appears to be-an uptight, efficient, widowed receptionist-then I’m Winston Churchill,” Karp said. “She’s going to check with the janitorial company that cleans the office. No, I think this is part of Kane’s little game-first the black bishop and Fey is killed; then week before last, the black knight, and the target is Flanagan, the dirty cop. I should say that Lucy thinks it’s not Kane sending us these pieces, but someone close enough to him to know his plans and is sending these as some sort of coded message. But I think Kane’s telling us he’s about to make his move and is challenging us to counter him.”

“So who’s the white bishop?” Marlene asked.

“Good question,” Karp replied. “If the type of piece has something to do with occupation and which side of the fence you sit-bishops for church people, knights for cops, white for good, black for bad-then one of the ‘good guys’ with the church.”

“What about Father Dugan?” Marlene said. “He and Alejandro were the ones who uncovered the ‘No Prosecution’ files and gave them to you.”

“That’s a possibility,” Karp said. “I’ll call Bill Denton and ask him to assign some guys to Dugan. Where is he now?”

“St. Malachy’s Church on West Forty-ninth,” Marlene said. “The Actors’ Chapel.”

Karp picked up the telephone and placed a call to his friend Denton, the brother of the current mayor of New York and recently appointed chief of police for the NYPD. When Denton answered, Karp quickly explained what had happened and asked for the extra set of eyes on the priest. “Thanks, Bill,” he said. “Let’s talk over lunch one of these days soon.” He hung up the telephone and turned back to Jaxon. “You want to send somebody by to pick up the other pieces. Unfortunately, I didn’t understand their significance and they’ve been handled, but maybe your people can still find something of value.”

Jaxon nodded. “We might even be able to piece the newspaper Kane used to pack the box and find out where it’s from. But what if this chess piece doesn’t represent Dugan? What if it’s just white for good and black for bad, in which case, the white bishop could be someone else?”

“You know, I may have seen someone suspicious watching the loft the past couple of days,” Marlene said. “I just happened to be looking down across Grand and noticed a couple of guys, looked Mediterranean or Middle Eastern. I hate to stereotype, but they were paying a lot of attention to what’s going on here.”

“The guys selling the purses!” Zak crowed and punched his brother on the arm. “I told you.”

“You thought they were federal agents,” Giancarlo replied, punching back.

“I never said that,” Zak contended. “I said they’re watching the loft. I didn’t say if they were feds or terrorists.”

“So you saw them, too,” their mother interjected. “They were certainly more interested in watching the loft than selling purses, especially after the boys got home from school. I was about to go visit them when that poor bicycle guy delivered the package and got jumped.”

“Well, if you see them again, sic the cops on them,” Jaxon said.

“Oh, I’ll sic more than that.” Marlene smiled and scratched Gilgamesh behind his ears.