The Knowland Retribution

Clarksville

He rejected seeing the slow-witted handyman Michael DelGrazo a second time, and, in the clear light of a New Mexico morning, realized that waiting for Leonard’s return was useless. Instead, he decided to go where he knew Carter Lawrence had been, and where, he was almost positive, Leonard Martin had been too. Somewhere they might have been seen by somebody. Walter flew to Atlanta again, this time changing planes and continuing on to Nashville. From Nashville, the drive to Clarksville, Tennessee would be about an hour. Before he left St. John, he checked some of the credit card records for Nicholas Stevenson and Harvey Daniels. He knew they were the ones Carter had met in Tennessee-it had to be them-but he wanted to be certain. Preparation was always the key element in solving a puzzle. There were times when Walter had to act quickly without it, but this was not one of them. “Two plus two is always four,” he told himself. No matter the certainty of the math, he knew it was always best to check your work. He set about that task. He knew exactly what he was looking for, and it took little time to find it. Both men had flown to Nashville on the same day Carter Lawrence drove to Clarksville. In Nashville, Nick Stevenson rented a car that he returned the next day with 117 miles on it. On the map, Clarksville was about fifty-five miles from Nashville. He found no hotel charges and he knew why. He smiled at their amateurism. They had paid cash for their rooms, thinking they would go unidentified. It might have worked if they hadn’t rented the car. The airline tickets were fine, absolutely normal. “After all,” Walter thought, “two lawyers from Atlanta traveling to Nashville for the day-happens all the time.” The car gave them away. It is possible to rent a car for cash, but it’s not easy. It’s also possible to use your credit card to actually get the car and then pay cash when you return it. Thus, no record. But, of course, Walter knew you’d have to be experienced in the ways of such secrecy to understand things like that. If people realized how simple and quick it is to read the story of anyone’s life via their credit card activity, they’d pay cash for everything.

The Pakistani gentleman who registered Walter at the Holiday Inn in Clarksville told him the restaurant was open for dinner until ten o’clock. He’d been flying since early morning, and the drive from Nashville was so dull he almost fell asleep at the wheel. A nap was what he needed. He awoke around seven, washed his face, changed his shirt, and strolled toward the restaurant. The dining room was half filled. Syrupy recorded music, heavy on the strings, played too loudly. Walter found a table next to the window as far from the smokers as he could. A young Korean girl brought him a menu. For a moment Walter wondered how an Indian or Pakistani ends up a hotel clerk in a place like this, and how a Korean woman gets to be a waitress in a Holiday Inn in rural Tennessee. Then he remembered that Clarksville was an Army town. Fort Campbell, Kentucky was just up the road. In his sleepiness he must have missed the billboards. There are probably wives around here from every place on earth graced with the presence of U.S. troops in the last half century. He assumed this girl was married to a soldier in the 101st. When she brought him his Diet Coke, he asked, “Do you always work the dinner shift?” The Korean girl didn’t know what to make of this question. Walter saw her reticence and added quickly, “Have you seen this man?” He showed her a photo of Carter Lawrence.

“No,” the girl said.

“You’ve never seen him before?”

“No. I am just filling in tonight. I don’t usually work this late.”

“Oh, I see,” Walter said. “Thank you. Is there anyone else here who does who might have seen him?”

“I don’t know. You can ask someone else. Maybe Melissa. I can ask her to come over.”

“Please do. Thanks.” Walter ordered a chef salad and some french fries. Maybe a gut as hard as a rock wasn’t completely out of the question. When his waitress had taken the order, she walked over to where another waitress stood, killing time, hoping for a larger crowd later in the evening. Walter saw the Korean woman point to him as she said something to the other woman, who then looked in his direction too. Then the other waitress, a chunky, middle-aged white woman, walked over to his table. The little plastic pin above her right breast read “Debra Melissa.”

“Thanks, Melissa. Thanks for coming over.”

“You looking for somebody?” she asked, keeping her distance.

“No. Not exactly. But I am looking for someone who might have seen this man.” Walter showed her the photograph of Carter Lawrence.

“You a cop?” she asked, then answered her own question. “You’re no cop.”

Her eyes gave her away, and Walter saw it. Of course he saw it. He’d seen that same expression many times before in many places. She recognized the picture. “Of course I’m not a cop,” he said. “You’ve seen this man, haven’t you? You served him, right?” She said nothing. It appeared she was mulling it over, trying to decide if she ought to reveal anything to this stranger. “Where the hell is he from?” he imagined her asking herself. He was exactly correct. She was thinking, “Nobody comes in here with a tan like that just before Christmas.” She remained silent.

“Look,” said Walter, taking a hundred dollar bill and laying it down on the table, putting its edge just under his Diet Coke. “I just want to know if you saw him last month sometime.” Melissa looked at the hundred; a sight she saw not often enough to please her. She looked again at the photo. It was the skinny one, the one with the long wrists and geeky neck, the young one who sat next to the cowboy.

“What if I have?”

“I take that as a ‘yes.’ The hundred is yours, if I’m right.”

As she reached to take the money off the table, Walter’s hand fell on top of it. “And did he have dinner with this man?” He showed her a photo of Leonard Martin, the one printed on the front page of the New York Times. The woman was startled. She hesitated momentarily, then said, “I’ve never seen him before.” She put her finger on the picture of Leonard Martin.

“You’re sure?” Walter said.

“Yeah, I’m sure. The younger one, the skinny one, was here. He was here.” Poor Melissa was worried she wouldn’t get the money.

“He had dinner with someone, didn’t he?”

“Yes, he did, but not this one.” Again she pointed to Leonard. “He and three other men. They ate right over there. Stayed until after we closed. I remember them. They had a lot of papers and things. Talked a lot, ate a little. This one,” she tapped Carter’s photo with her index finger, “but not this one.”

“What about these two? Walter laid pictures of Nicholas Stevenson and Harvey Daniels on the table. All four photos were lined up in a row, facing Melissa. Walter removed his hand from the hundred and motioned for her to take it. She did. She recognized the silver-haired gentleman who’d left her the extra tip and the nervous one who sat next to him.

“Both of them. They were here with the first one.”

“The three of them? Did you get any names?”

“No,” she said. “There was another man who came later.”

“The younger one paid, right?”

“How’d you know that?”

“Just a guess.”

“You know,” she said, “I’ll never forget when they left. Hugged each other like there was no tomorrow. It was weird, like a movie.”

“I know,” Walter said. “I’m sure they did. Thank you, Melissa. You’ve been very helpful.”

“Why are you looking for these guys?”

“Just routine. Our company checks the expense accounts of people who travel for us on a regular basis. I’m just confirming they were here, that’s all.”

“Bullshit,” she thought. No one checks expense accounts like this, not with hundred dollar bills and photographs. And for damn sure not with any guy as tan as this one.

“One more thing,” he said. “Who was the fourth man? What can you tell me about him?”

Melissa said, “You mean the cowboy?”

“Cowboy? What did he look like?”

“Well, he wasn’t a real cowboy, you know. It’s just he didn’t wear a suit like the others, and he had on a hat, a floppy kind of cowboy hat, you know? Tall, thin, good-looking man. Short hair, sort of salt-and-pepper beard. Good-looking man. Forties, I’d say. That’s all, but he sure wasn’t this guy.” This time she tapped the photo from the New York Times again. “He wasn’t here.”

A chill gripped Walter’s gut and moved like electric current outward. It made him lightheaded, nauseated. Respect the obvious. He hadn’t looked, hadn’t seen, and now it was too late. The missing piece crashed into place and a second wave of nausea rose. He should have known all along. Instead he’d been blind as a bat. The Indian woman’s pendant had shown him the mysteries of altered shapes and he missed it. Was he was losing it? Had he lost it already? His eyesight wasn’t what it had been, nor was the hair on his head. And whatever Isobel told him, neither were his hydraulics. Henry Broomfield’s punchline roared, an angry, reproachful, soundless voice, an unforgiving scold. They all got sisters.

New Mexico

Leonard was gone within an hour. He’d practiced playing the slow-witted Michael, planned on using it in case anyone made a wrong turn and stumbled onto his property. No one had until now. The business about Mr. Marteenez had been a spur-of-the-moment thing. It worked pretty well, he thought. Walter Sherman had been an unnerving surprise. Sure, Leonard heard the car approaching long before it reached the cabin, but he never thought someone would actually find him there; someone whose intention it was to seek him out. That frightened him. How could he have come to this place? And who are these people from New York? What was he talking about? Had this man been sent by Nathan Stein? And if so, how in the world did he know where to find him? Leonard knew he didn’t have the luxury of contemplating these questions. He had to hurry.

He knew this man calling himself Walter Sherman was trouble when he asked to use the bathroom. It was obvious he wanted to look inside the cabin. Leonard didn’t like it, but considering the circumstances he had little choice in the matter. How could he refuse? He didn’t fear exposure. Clearly he was convincingly unrecognizable. The weapons and ammunition were all locked away securely. That was an arrangement Leonard had come up with at the very beginning. He was going to be away for long stretches of time: Boston, Houston, Tennessee, Nevada, and who knows where else. He couldn’t risk someone finding his equipment, so he devised a storage compartment in his bedroom. To the naked eye it appeared as a closet, but behind the plain closet door was another locked door, this one made of steel protecting a safelike box four feet square and eight feet high. Inside were racks of rifles, shelves of special accessories, sights, stocks, cleaning materials, and boxes of ammunition. Walter Sherman could look around all he liked and never find a sign they were there. And Leonard was sure that was exactly why Sherman asked to use the facilities.

As soon as the intruder left, as soon as the sound of his car faded to silence, Leonard began packing. There wasn’t much to it. He threw a few clothes into a bag, tossed in his toothbrush and other toiletries, grabbed three jackets hanging from hooks in the back room, and loaded it all in the SUV. It took about forty-five minutes to move the rifles and other stuff from the secure closet to a lock box in the SUV. When it didn’t all fit, he decided to leave some of the ammunition behind. It was a risk traveling with weapons, but what choice did he have now? “Just make sure,” he told himself, “do not get stopped by a cop on the highway.”

Finally, he tucked a metal toolbox behind the driver’s seat on the floor. It was filled with hundred dollar bills neatly wrapped in packs of ten thousand dollars each. Then he was gone. He would never return. He did not look back. There was no nostalgia. Leaving was not sad. Nothing pulled at his heartstrings. In the last two and a half years Leonard Martin had learned not to become attached to anything. He’d shut himself off from feelings like that. He wouldn’t miss the sunsets or the crisp, chilly mornings, the smell of a fire crackling in the fireplace, the sounds of silence in the high desert. He wouldn’t miss them because he wouldn’t let himself. He came to New Mexico with a single goal-learn to kill. Having done that-and now being discovered-it was time to move on. He drove south on route 39, past Ute Lake and Logan, and picked up I-40 at San Jon. He was in Texas by the time Walter Sherman was considering his options.

New York

Just after seven, Isobel met Walter in the lobby of the Hilton on Sixth Avenue. Dressed for winter, she wore a wide-brimmed woolen hat pulled down to cover her ears and forehead, and a heavy scarf on top of the coat with the fake fur trimmings. She passed unrecognized. “Celebrity,” she thought, although her encounter with it was somewhat marginal and thus far short-lived, “was a crock of shit.”

“Why here?” she asked, after greeting him with a kiss on the cheek. It was a friendly kiss and he felt disappointed. He hoped for more and hoped it didn’t show.

“Dentists,” Walter answered. “There’s a convention of dentists here. The biggest one they have anywhere all year. Dentists love Christmas, and they love New York.” Isobel laughed and dropped her coat next to her on the couch. “Go ahead,” Walter said, “look around you. Every one of these guys pulls teeth.”

“What about the women? What do they do?”

“Hookers,” said Walter after only a slight pause.

“All of them? It appears, perhaps, that some of your American dentists prefer hookers who are, shall we say, older and a twinge on the heavy side.”

“Wives,” Walter said. “There’s a few of them too.”

“So, we’re here to see the dentist?”

“No, we’re here because the dentists do not want to see us-you, in particular. I don’t need to be ducking photographers, but you do. By the way, how did a photographer get that picture of you and whathisname in Tibet?” Isobel laughed, and so did Walter.

“It’s a hoot alright, Walter,” she said, “but honestly, I think it’s a tub of crap. Hard to imagine any person, no matter how well known, who can’t leave the makeup home, dress as casually as everyone does these days, and just walk about. I do it quite well, thank you.”

Walter said, “So, no cloak and dagger stuff for you? I’m overdoing it, you think?”

“Absolutely,” she smiled.

“We don’t need the dentists? Or anyone to cover our movements?”

“We don’t need no stinkin’ dentists,” she said.

Now he too was smiling. Isobel leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. This was more than a friendly kiss, and it thrilled him.

“No one knows who I am,” she said, using her father’s accent again. “I go anywhere and everywhere, just like the common folk.”

“Well, in that case,” Walter said, “let’s go get a good steak. I’m starving and don’t mind spending forty-five bucks for a piece of meat.” They left the Hilton and cabbed the short distance to Ben Benson’s, Walter’s favorite New York steakhouse.

When their salads arrived, Walter said, “I saw him, talked to him, used his bathroom.” Isobel was speechless. She knew he meant Leonard. A forkful of salad never made it to her mouth. Walter waited for something, but Isobel said nothing. Her eyes registered amazement.

“I found him in New Mexico. Way out in the middle of nowhere.”

“How?” she asked. And he told her everything: the guns, North Dakota, and Raleigh; the trip to New Mexico, the Pac-Mail store in Las Vegas, and the lonely cabin north of Albert. He told her how a tall, rock-hard, bearded man with some marked limitations named Michael DelGrazo said he worked for a Leonard Marteenez, not a Leonard Martin. He described the inside of the cabin. He told her how he decided to follow up the lead in Tennessee, how credit-card receipts told him Carter Lawrence had gone there to meet Nicholas Stevenson, Harvey Daniels, and a third man. He told her about Debra Melissa Wallis and the man she called the cowboy.

“My God,” said Isobel. “Michael DelGrazo is the cowboy.”

“No. Not quite. Michael DelGrazo was a man who lost his wife and children in an apartment fire in Detroit in 1962.” Isobel looked at him bewildered and confused.

“The apartment house was owned by a man named Robert Bass. It seemed Bass had paid off the fire department inspector, a man named Willard Cox, who, in turn, gave the building a clean bill of health. The place was, of course, a fire hazard, and it soon burned to the ground, taking DelGrazo’s family with it. When DelGrazo learned all this from a newspaper investigative expose, he hunted down both Bass and Cox and shot them dead. Michael DelGrazo died in prison in 1984, prostate cancer.”

“Wow,” Isobel said. “Then this Michael DelGrazo is…?” Her question hung in the air. She knew the answer already, but Walter obliged.

“Leonard Martin.”

“Oh, my God. B-but you said he looked like-”

“A man can change a lot of things in two years. Leonard did. I missed it, completely missed it.”

“The blindfold,” she said, remembering Kermit and her interview, in the dark, with Leonard. “That’s why the blindfold.” She felt bad saying it, but she said it nonetheless.

Walter described his misadventure in New Mexico again, this time in fine detail. Isobel strained to hear every word in the noisy restaurant. She asked, and he said he didn’t think there was much chance Leonard would call. Their steaks arrived, although they hadn’t touched the salads yet. The waiter insisted he would bring them new steaks, freshly cooked, whenever they were ready for them. Walter insisted the waiter leave the entrees. They would eat everything at the same time. The man was reluctant, but, as any good waiter would, he protested but consented. They ate everything he put in front of them.

“Don’t be disappointed,” Isobel said. “Don’t be hard on yourself.”

“I’m not,” Walter replied in his trademark easy manner. “I know where he’s been, where he’s gone, what he’s done. And I believe there’s no rush. He’s not killing anybody, is he?”

“I wasn’t aware he had a schedule.”

“There was a pattern to the intervals. Hopman, MacNeal, Ochs, and Grath. Then he stopped and what did he do?” Walter took a sip of his wine. He looked for a response. Finally, Isobel said, “I don’t know. Nothing.”

“Exactly. Nothing. Not yet anyway.”

“That means something?”

“Yes. I think it does.”

“What?”

“Now I’m the one who doesn’t know.” He smiled at her and she smiled back for lack of something better and smarter to do.

“You’ll find him again?” she asked.

“I think he’ll find you again before I find him. I have a feeling he’s got something in mind. Whatever it is, he’ll need you to tell it.” Isobel did not reply. After a moment of silence, Walter said, “I saw you with Ed Bradley.” She nodded. “You like him, don’t you? Sympathize with him, right?”

“Bradley?”

“Leonard. You’re inclined to think he’s righteous. Am I wrong?”

“How would you feel?” she asked. “What would you do?”

“No, no,” Walter said shaking his head, holding up his hands. “Don’t ask me how I feel. Tell me how you feel.”

“I do,” she said. “It’s not academic to Leonard Martin, not just numbers. They took everything from him. Can you imagine losing everything? It frightens me just to think about it-not only his family-everything. There’s a curse in being a survivor. Yes, I sympathize with him. I can’t help it.”

“And the people he’s killed? And those he means to kill? All of them?”

“I can’t say,” she said. “I can’t say. I said I sympathize with him. That’s not the same as saying I approve of what he’s doing.”

“It isn’t?” That question remained unanswered.

Over coffee and a glass of Spanish port, Isobel asked, “Walter, why are we still working together? You were correct. I could never have identified Leonard Martin on my own. You did, and you did it before he contacted me. However, now we’ve both met him, talked to him. I know who he is and my story is no longer questioned by anyone. You know who he is. You say finding him again is no trouble. Why are we still in this together, Walter? What’s left for us to do?”

“I represent the people who remain on his list-”

“Exactly my point. What’s in it for you or your clients? Why do you need me? And what’s in it for me?”

“And,” Walter continued, “that puts me in a position to arrange a negotiated settlement, an end to the killing. When he reaches out to you, I can put him in touch with Stein and Stein’s money.”

Isobel looked at Walter out of the corner of her eye, her mouth a frown, skepticism written all over her face. She had been impressed with Walter’s self-assurance and intelligence from the first time they met. She found his demeanor enchanting and not a little bit erotic. Now she began to question his approach and her own judgment.

“Stein’s money,” she said. “What in the world makes you think Leonard Martin wants any of it? And why are you still working for them after learning what they’re all about?”

“I got paid,” Walter said. Isobel shrugged her shoulders, recalling a film where Humphrey Bogart had a speech about some silly obligation he felt to his partner.

“That’s p-p-plain ridiculous.”

“I took the job. I got paid and I have an obligation to finish the job. That’s not ridiculous. That’s honorable. As for Leonard, don’t discount him so easily. Remember when I asked you to think of a dollar amount and then double it or triple it? You’d be surprised how much money might be involved here. It could be an offer Leonard Martin can’t refuse.”

“No,” Isobel said. “Not for any amount. Not this man. Not a man who uses the name of Michael DelGrazo. It’s love, Walter. Don’t you see that? There’s no price on love. It’s too important.” Walter stirred his second cup of coffee, wondering what Ike would say to that.

“You’re right. I don’t need you to find Leonard,” he said. “Now that I know what I know, a second time is only a matter of where and when. That’s what I do, you know. I find people no one else can.” He was looking down into his coffee or at his napkin or checking out the brand name carved into the blade of his steak knife. He avoided Isobel’s eyes. He felt the rush of blood to his cheeks. He hadn’t experienced this kind of helplessness since high school. Isobel could see he was troubled. She leaned across the table and took his hands in hers. She knew there must be more than the lame excuse he offered. “What is it?” she said. “It’s something, but what?”

“I want to be with you,” he said, terribly afraid he sounded like a sixteen year old. “It has nothing to do with Leonard. You’re right. Find him or not. I really don’t care. It’s you, Isobel. I think about you all the time. I don’t sleep. Tonight’s the first time I’ve eaten a real meal since you left St. John. I want you.”

Walter’s needy desire, his awkward hesitation, his tender honesty-it all did the trick for Isobel. Her faucets ran wide open and red hot.

“You want to go to my place?” she said. The invitation and the promise it held thrilled Walter. Whatever disappointment he felt at her casual greeting at the Hilton was gone now.

“Would you like to see what a snow-covered Central Park looks like from high up?”

“Sure,” she said. “ The Mayflower’s close enough. Shall we walk?”

Bundled up to stay warm on the windy, cold night, they walked arm-in-arm toward Columbus Circle and the Mayflower Hotel. It was close to eleven o’clock, but this was New York, the city that never sleeps, where the streets were always crowded. Kids, couples in their twenties (kids to Walter, anyway), ran past them toward the park, tossing snowballs at each other. Many stores and all the bars and restaurants were still open. “In New York the magic never ends,” Walter thought. Tonight he was alive too. He pictured Isobel unbuttoning her blouse, slipping it off her back, her skirt dropping to the floor of his bedroom a few blocks away. His whole body tingled in anticipation. That was when the man standing by the window of an electronics store caught Walter’s attention. Something inside him stirred, and it had nothing to do with the thought of Isobel’s naked body against his own. Walter was sure he’d seen the same man near the Hilton. They passed the store and Walter glanced quickly behind him. He knew the man could easily see their reflection in the store window. Walter and Isobel continued walking. The man followed them.

At the corner of 60th Street, Walter put his hand on Isobel’s shoulder. She looked at him, and the look on his face frightened her. They stopped right in front of the Trump Hotel. The man who had been behind them kept walking, past them. He stopped at the next corner. And he waited. Walter watched the traffic light at 61st Street go from red to green, and then to red again and once more to green. Walk… don’t walk… walk. The man did not cross the street.

“Don’t say anything,” Walter said. “We go to this corner and turn left. Trust me.” They resumed walking, and at the corner of 61st Street, where the man who followed them was still standing, they turned west, heading toward Broadway. That block is a dark and empty one. The side of the Trump Hotel has no customer entrance. The other side of the street is the southern face of the Mayflower. It also has no public entrance. There is only a solitary apartment building with its awning entrance well down the street on the other side. Halfway down the block, on their side, there was a service entrance to the Trump Hotel. It was an unlit, windowless metal door set back slightly from the sidewalk. Walter could make out the icy walkway in front of the doorway. He and Isobel were a few feet past that door, firmly on a patch of dry cement, when Walter turned.

“Got a match?” he said to the man, who now stood squarely on the icy spot. He was clearly startled by Walter’s unexpected action. For just an instant the man seemed paralyzed. Then his feet moved, but all he could manage was an uncertain slip.

Walter lunged and grabbed him. He spun him around and slammed him face-first against the metal service door. He ripped the man’s coat off from behind and seemed to jam his hand into the man’s ass.

“You know what you’re feeling?” Walter demanded. The man shook his head nervously.

“No,” he said, the word barely escaping his mouth.

“Who are you?” demanded Walter. The man did not respond. “What you’re feeling is the barrel of a small twenty-two caliber pistol. If you don’t answer my questions, quickly and truthfully, I’m going to shoot you. Do you know what that means?” This time Walter didn’t wait for an answer. “It means a twenty-two magnum cartridge will literally cut you a new asshole. It probably won’t kill you. But the damage it does to your colon and your intestines will take years to fix. Maybe decades. You’ll shit in a bag until you’re an old man, and every time you so much as pass gas you’ll think of me and regret whatever impulse you’re feeling now to withhold information. Have I made myself clear?” Walter reached into the man’s coat pocket and removed a pistol. He ran his hand across the man’s chest and took a second gun from his shoulder holster. “You hear me, asshole!”

“Yes,” the man said. Isobel could taste the fear in his voice. She too was imagining the lifetime of pain and discomfort that awaited the wrong decision.

“Who are you?” Walter asked. He pushed harder into the man’s rectum.

“Jack Allen,” the man said.

“And?” said Walter, pushing even harder.

“I’m a New York City police detective.”

Isobel was shocked, certain they had stumbled into something that meant trouble for both of them. Holding a gun to the asshole of an NYPD detective…

“Name,” Walter commanded. This time he took the man’s wallet and flipped it open. The badge was there and the ID card. “You want me to start counting? Because when I get to one your ass is on fire.”

“Allen. Jack Allen. I already told you.” There was panic in the man’s voice. Isobel could feel how desperate he was to save himself.

“You’re not on the job, goddamn it! Your ID is old, shitface. You’re retired. Name who you work for, fuckhead!” said Walter.

“I’m an NYPD detective,” said the man claiming to be Jack Allen.

“Fuck you, detective!” Walter growled in his ear. “I don’t hear another name I shoot.”

“No!” the man cried out. “Don’t shoot me! I work for a man named Robert Wilkes. I really do. Wilkes hired me.”

“To do what? Follow me?”

“No, no. I don’t have any idea who you are, man. I’m following her.”

A chill ran through Isobel’s body, not unlike what she felt talking to Leonard Martin. She remembered. Leonard said she was being watched.

“Her?” Walter screamed. “Why? Hurry up now, Jack.”

“Wilkes thought she would lead me to Leonard Martin.”

“You fucking sonofabitch!” Isobel kicked him just below his knee. Allen stumbled, but Walter held him up, pushing the pistol as deep into his asshole as he could. He felt the man’s pants tear.

“Then what?” Walter asked in voice more at ease than anything he’d said before. “Then what, Jack?”

“Nothing. Just go back and tell Wilkes where he’s at.”

“You won’t hear the sound of this gun, you know that? When I pull the trigger you’ll feel it like a hot poker ramming up your ass into your gut.” The man, Jack Allen or whatever his name was, groaned and slumped to the ground. Urine was flowing on the sidewalk, steaming in the cold winter air as it inched its way to the curb. Walter had not shot him.

“You’re out of business, Jack. Tell that to Wilkes and whoever he works for. I ever see you again, you’re a dead man, got it?” Jack Allen didn’t say anything. He was pissing and sobbing at the same time. Walter threw the wallet down on the street but kept the badge, the ID, and the guns.

“Come on,” he said to Isobel. “Let’s go.”

“Sure,” she said, but Isobel Gitlin wasn’t sure of anything anymore.

New York

The smell of fresh coffee woke Isobel. The bedroom drapes were open and a brilliant morning flooded in through the glass. The city that never sleeps at least naps, and now its nap was over. It was wide awake once more. Horns blared. Traffic inched forward on the streets below. Darting through the bare limbs of trees in snowy Central Park, an occasional jogger could be seen. The sun was bright in a cloudless sky, although the air looked cold to her. Steam heat whistled from the pipes in Walter’s suite. He always asked for accommodations on the side of the hotel that had not been renovated. He told her that the first time, when she met him in the restaurant. He liked his hotels old. He preferred steam heat over hot air. She heard him on the phone in the living room where the coffee awaited, but she was unable to make out what he was saying. Isobel stretched and yawned. The sex had been fantastic, and the pendant he’d put around her neck when they were both naked was beautiful. Intrigue and danger, mixed with the sweat of their bodies, had driven them to furious heights. “Wartime sex must really be something,” Isobel thought. Violence, she already knew, went with sex like brandy with coffee. It made the moment more intense and the aftermath sweeter. She bent down and picked up the pillow on Walter’s side of the bed. Holding it close against her face, she inhaled, smiled, and tossed it back on the sheets. Then she headed for the shower.

“Yes,” said Tom Maloney, answering his cell phone on the first ring. His voice was cold with a touch of anger poorly hidden. Walter had no sympathy for the difficulties of Tom Maloney’s existence. The New York Times was on Maloney’s ass. They continued to talk about him on cable TV, and the liberal press wrote piece after piece, coming this close to saying that he and his gang of co-conspirators deserved to be shot. Leonard Martin, already regarded as America’s most effective and efficient multiple killer since The Terminator, wanted him dead. Maloney’s charmed life had turned to pure shit, but Walter couldn’t care less. He was pissed about a retired NYPD cop and Robert Wilkes, whoever he was. There was no “hello” in his manner or his voice.

“Wilkes,” said Walter. “Robert Wilkes.”

“Sherman? Is that you?”

“Tell me about Wilkes, Tom.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking-”

“If I hang up, Tom, you’ll never hear from me again.” There was only silence on the other end of the line. “Tell me about Wilkes.”

“I don’t understand,” Maloney said. “How do you know about Wilkes? Does Wilkes know about you?” He thought, “What have I gotten myself into.” Could it be that people like Walter Sherman and the FBI Special Agent Wilkes knew each other, traveled in the same circles like business associates or something? Could there be a world out there he knew nothing of? One that posed a new danger to him? Maloney hadn’t said a word to Wilkes about Walter Sherman, and he certainly didn’t tell Walter about hiring Wilkes first. Tom Maloney was, however, quick on his feet. “Nathan made a mistake in judgment, Walter. I didn’t think you needed to know, and that was a mistake I made. I see that now and I’m sorry. But I still don’t understand-”

“Isobel Gitlin,” said Walter. “Just what the hell is that all about?”

“Mother of God!” Maloney thought, “that bitch,” and he almost said as much out loud. “She’s a reporter with-”

“I know who she is. Why did you sic Wilkes on her?”

“I didn’t know-”

“You didn’t know? Is that it? You didn’t know?”

“I still don’t know. What are you talking about?”

Walter shook his head in disgust, in frustration. He heard the shower go on. “Tom?” he said.

“Yes?”

“Detective Jack Allen. Does that name mean anything to you?”

“No.”

“Never heard of him?”

“Never.” Maloney had regained his composure and sensed that Walter had too. “Who is he?”

Walter told him about the encounter with Jack Allen. He left out the part about shoving his 22 magnum up the detective’s ass-and, of course, said nothing about Isobel-but he made it clear he had taken control of the situation with Wilkes’s man. Maloney was still in the dark.

“ What an asshole,” thought Walter. “An amateur, a total fuck-up!”

“You hired Wilkes to kill Leonard, didn’t you?” he asked.

“Nathan-”

“Come on, Tom. Don’t fuck with me. I have no patience for it. We both know Nathan couldn’t hire anybody and get it right. You hired Wilkes.”

Maloney’s first instinct was to soothe his own hurt feelings. After all, he’d been hired by Nathan Stein, but he was scared. Leonard Martin wanted to kill him, and now Walter Sherman was heading in the same direction. “Yes, I did. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I am. I am.”

“What did you think Wilkes was going to do? How did you expect him to go about his business? Did you give any thought to that at all?”

Maloney said, “No. I hire the best professionals. I pay top dollar. Why should I inquire about details? I don’t ask how, just how soon. I hired you, didn’t I? As I remember it I gave you a million dollars. Did I ask you how?”

“You stupid shit,” Walter said. “Wilkes was going to kill the girl!”

“Bullshit! He was going to kill Leonard Martin! You stupid shit!” Tom Maloney yelled at the top of his voice. He was not used to being talked to that way. His reaction showed Walter everything. Walter realized Maloney, for all his money and power, really didn’t know how people like Wilkes operate. “It must be so easy to kill people when you don’t know how they’re going to die,” he thought.

“Calm down, Tom,” he said. “Let me tell you the facts of life here, fill you in on Wilkes’s plan.” Walter took Tom Maloney through it step by step. The more he disclosed, the more convinced he was that Maloney had no idea what he had started. When he was finished, Walter said, “I want you to know that if anything bad happens to Isobel Gitlin-anything at all-if she gets mugged, hit by a bus, falls down a flight of stairs, has a heart attack, is struck by lightning-anything at all-I’ll hold you responsible, Tom. And if I ever see one of Wilkes’s people again I’ll make them very mad at you. You’ll regret that. You understand what I mean?”

“Look, Walter, I-”

“Just say ‘I understand.’ I need to hear it, Tom.”

Maloney cleared his throat which was very dry now and said, “I understand.”

“Good.”

“I’ll cancel the arrangement with Wilkes as soon as you and I get off the phone. By the way, Walter, how do you know Isobel Gitlin?”

“That doesn’t matter,” Walter replied. “Now listen to me. You’ll like this part. I’m going to tell you about Leonard Martin. I saw him. I talked to him. He’s gone now, but I can find him again, easily. I gave him my number. He might even call me.”

“You found him! That’s great news-just great. When? Where? I knew you could do it. Am I allowed to or supposed to ask you how?”

Walter told Maloney about his trip to the New Mexico wilderness north of Albert. He told him about the empty tract of land Leonard bought, and the small cabin. He didn’t mention Michael DelGrazo or Leonard’s altered physical appearance. He considered that his own proprietary information. He saw no need to tell Tom about Clarksville. Carter Lawrence, Nick Stevenson, and Harvey Daniels were not part of his contract, just as Isobel Gitlin was not part of Wilkes’s deal. When he finished, he asked, “What do you want to do with Leonard Martin? What do you want me to do? I’m just as anxious as you are to get this over, to go home. What’s it going to be?”

“Jesus, Walter, this is fantastic. I can’t tell you how good this makes me feel. I want you to come over to the Waldorf-that’s where I’m pretty much holed up these days. Nathan’s here too. We can go over our plans together. How soon can you be here?”

Walter listened. The shower was off. Isobel was only a closed door away. “Noon,” he said. Maloney told him to call the penthouse from the house phone in the lobby when he got to the Waldorf.

Then Maloney spoke as if addressing one of his sales managers. “Congratulations. Job well done. We’re all proud of you.” For a brief moment Walter considered the possibility that Tom had lost his mind.

He opened the door to the bedroom. Isobel was dressed and brushing her hair. She had sprayed the same perfume she wore last night. The scent excited him. Walter wanted nothing more than to grab her, throw her down on the bed, and make love to her.

“What did you mean if ‘something bad’ happened to me?” She continued, brushing her hair while looking at him in the mirror. “I heard you say that. What did you mean? Who were you talking to?”

He had carried a fresh cup of coffee with him, and he put it down on the dresser in front of Isobel. “Thanks,” she said. He walked over to the window. A faint draft of cold air from the window frame, which had no doubt gone untouched for thirty or forty years, drifted across his face. It felt good.

“Our friend from the New York Police Department worked for a man hired by Tom Maloney, a man named Robert Wilkes. I can’t be certain, but my guess is Wilkes is either FBI or CIA, and, unlike Detective Allen, he’s an active duty agent.”

“W-what about-”

“No, Isobel. Don’t ask me anything. Not yet. When I’m done there will be plenty of time for questions.” She nodded, and Walter sat on the edge of the bed. He continued, “Wilkes was brought in to kill Leonard. He couldn’t find him, of course. He didn’t even know who he was hired to kill until he read about it in the New York Times. That’s where you come in. Guys like Wilkes assemble a team, and so he got a retired cop, that’s Allen, to follow you, hoping Leonard would contact you again and you would lead Allen to Leonard. If such a meeting happened-once you and Leonard were in the same place together-Allen would show up. He’d kill Leonard with one gun and then kill you with the other. He’d place the gun he used to shoot you in Leonard’s hand. Wilkes then takes over and there could be many possible scenarios, but any way they do it, the official story ends up with Leonard Martin killing you and someone in law enforcement killing Leonard. “Courageous Reporter Murdered by Madman Killer: Hero Cop Kills Murderer.”

Isobel seemed unfazed. “That’s why Allen had two guns?” Walter shook his head yes. “You were talking to Maloney, weren’t you?” Again Walter shook his head yes. “You told him if ‘anything bad’ happened to me you’d kick the shit out of him. Did you tell him you would cut him a new asshole with that little pistol of yours?” Walter shook his head no. A smile spread across his rugged face. “You’re a wonderful man, Walter Sherman. My hero.” Isobel began unbuttoning her blouse. “I can always take another shower,” she said.

Northfield

In his other life, Leonard hated long-distance driving. If Nina hadn’t shared the five-hour trek to Hilton Head, they never would have spent so many weekends there. He recalled those days now, now when things were so different. He had been impatient then. Now he felt safe in his SUV: secure, comfortable, at peace with himself. He enjoyed the hours spent on the interstates, the noise of the tires at high speed, the music on the radio, the truck stops and gas stations along the way. The first trip from Atlanta to New Mexico had not been the drudgery he expected, and the drive two years later to Boston had been downright exhilarating-a feeling Leonard credited to his mission. Justice, at last. Even though the unexpected arrival of Walter Sherman made it necessary to leave New Mexico quickly, Leonard was not upset. His mission was not complete and he had work to do elsewhere. On the road again.

He watched the high desert mountains and stony foothills of New Mexico and west Texas fade in his rearview mirror. He drove across the flatlands of Oklahoma into Missouri and Kansas. Traffic got heavier in the urban midsection of the country: Illinois, Indiana, Ohio. Still, the long, straight stretches of interstate did not conjure up the unpleasant memories of those sleepy, endless miles on I-16 from Macon to Savannah. And yet the sadness in his belly never left him. Nina was not there sitting next to him, reading her book, napping, ready whenever he needed to share the load. And he fought all thoughts of Dahlonaga.

The skies turned gray and the snows returned in Pennsylvania and western New York. Finally, Leonard arrived to find the mountains in Vermont thrilling, spectacular, and not at all like the unattractive jagged peaks of the Southwest. The beauty of New England’s winter-icicles dangling from the branches of snowy forests, streams flowing rapidly, somehow oblivious to the sub-freezing temperatures, and quaint two-lane roads winding their way through small towns-had him thinking about skiing, although he had never even once tried it. The closest he ever came was playing golf on a trip to Aspen that he and Nina made one summer. Three days after abandoning the cabin north of Albert, Leonard was nearly euphoric as he checked into the Centennial House hotel in Northfield, Massachusetts. He was less than five miles from the Vermont State Line, and no more than twenty minutes from Louise Hollingsworth’s new house. Perhaps, he thought, she didn’t know-but how could she not? He was a real estate lawyer. Did she think she could buy property and escape his notice?

Dr. Roy’s CD laid it out for him. Louise Hollingsworth, at a time of crisis and impending chaos, had a clear appreciation of the gravity of her situation. She had asked Dr. Roy directly about people dying.

The others were cold, calculating, unfeeling bastards, but Louise Hollingsworth knew exactly what she was doing. She weighed the toll it would take on others and she made a conscious decision to participate when her protest might have stopped it. And then she stage-managed the coverup, a scheme that continued to this day. The murderers at Stein, Gelb persisted in their claim they were nothing more than ignorant servants in the employ of their corporate masters. Little more than hired help. They had done their due diligence, they said. Under Louise Hollingsworth’s direction, assertions were made that experts (including Dr. Ganga Roy-conveniently dead and unable to speak for herself) told them nothing about the possibility of dire consequences. There had been no mention of a newer, different, more vicious strain of E. coli, they said. No talk of anyone dying. Leonard was not fooled. And, insofar as reasonable people might believe that the Gang of Four at Stein, Gelb were without guilt, Louise Hollingsworth was responsible. Her crimes were compounded. She had killed his family, then led the lie. It was all Leonard could do not to start shaking again the way he had during those first months in New Mexico. He drifted off into a troubled sleep on the floor of his hotel room, praying the dreams would not haunt him again, all night. His prayers went unanswered.

In the morning, Leonard found a spot where he could drive his SUV off the two-lane road that wound its way up and around the mountain overlooking Louise Hollingsworth’s house. Unless someone noticed the tire tracks in the snow, there was no way anyone would suspect his vehicle was parked behind the trees in the bushes. There were a few pine trees, their branches fluffy white, but none where they might cause him some concern. The area was heavily wooded, but except for the pines, in December there were no leaves on the trees. His sight lines were clean, undisturbed. He sensed a gentle swirling breeze coming from the northeast. No problem. In only minutes he found a place suitable for the folding chair and the Y-shaped, pointed metal stick he brought with him. The chair was something Leonard had come up with on his own. He took an ordinary metal folding chair, one with a cushioned seat, and carefully filed down each of the legs to a sharp, spiked point. By planting it and pushing down on the crossbars holding the front and back legs to the body of the chair, he could set it firmly into the ground and steady it, stable enough for sitting and shooting. He much preferred that to lying prone. The Y-shaped spear looked like a naked umbrella handle or one of those things rainmakers pretend to use in their act, and he drove it into the ground in front of him and rested the barrel of his rifle on the Y. How many times had he done just that in New Mexico? He’d lost track many months ago. He’d sat in that chair hour upon hour, in the mud, the rain, the snow, the scorching heat of the desert afternoon, and fired what seemed like a million rounds. Now, on a snowy hill in Vermont, he set up his position and watched Louise’s house through the powerful scope sitting atop the gleaming barrel of one of the world’s most spectacular weapons. His calculations told him the elevation was 247 feet 8 inches above the top stone step leading to her front door, and the distance was 1,380.2 yards from the door itself. Although he could have been much closer, he had no need to be. Leonard was dressed perfectly to withstand the weather. He had a thermos of Earl Grey tea and some hard candy. He settled in for the day. The stock nestled in his shoulder. The scope covered his right eye. The smell of gun oil was in the air. Sooner or later she would walk out that door and he would pull the trigger on his Walther WA2000 and watch her die.

Louise Hollingsworth was new to the area. The house was invisible from the main road. She was not missed. After two days of not calling New York-she had been phoning the Waldorf three or four times a day-Tom Maloney reluctantly called the police. They found her body lying in front of the doorway, still ajar behind her. Her contorted face, a Halloween mask frozen in pain, caused the medical examiner to conclude she took a long time to die.

Maloney and Stein were convinced he was headed for New York. They increased security at the Waldorf. When Tom called him, Wesley Pitts was actually relieved, although he made sure not to let on. Vermont was a long way from Mississippi. He’d made the right choice going to Mississippi. He felt safe. Had he known Leonard Martin was already in New Orleans, Pitts would have shit in his pants.