Shoot (28 page)

“Daniel Boone, right?”

“No,” Izzy snapped, “It’s Fess Parker as Davy Crockett.”

“Oh. Okay. Who’s Fess Parker?” I asked.

Izzy and Phil groaned. I handed Izzy my printouts, knowing he responded to hard copy better than digital. I told him about the rare coins matching the analysis of the musket balls.

“Hmm. Thanks. It’s interesting, I guess,” Izzy said, tossing the printouts onto his cluttered desk. “Normally, that would be great, but we have nothing to compare it to, no coins belonging to a suspect.”

“It’s totally insane,” Phil added. “Who would spend thousands on this?”

“Crazy billionaires. One of the Roehm brothers is a coin collector.”

“And you think it’s them?” Izzy asked, picking up my printouts again and looking at them.

“It’s all over TV,” Phil said. “I like ’em for it, too.”

“Any real evidence yet?” Izzy asked, not looking up. “No? Then I’m not going hard against anybody without any hard fucking proof. Especially against motherfucking billionaires.”

I had been pumped by my discoveries but my cop friends were so negative, I didn’t tell them about the flag, which was even more tenuous.

“Okay, what’ve
you
guys got?” I asked.

They hesitated but Izzy nodded. Phil said so far the drone I had downed was a dead end because all serial numbers had been removed from the whirlybird and the cameras. Working with the FBI, they were looking at drone manufacturers, gunpowder suppliers and gun dealers, trying to trace the explosive from the drone, processing the murder scenes, and waiting for more test results.

“I’ve got more than you do,” I bragged. They didn’t deny it. “So, where are the murder weapons?”

“The killers may have just walked in with them and then just walked,” said Phil. “Trees in a forest. They’re probably in the wind. Gone, maybe destroyed. The feds are trying to track them down but most of the politicos fled the jurisdiction after the shootings. Not that it matters.”

“Why not?”

Izzy handed me some paperwork. “Ballistics report,” he said. “Bottom line, there are no lands and grooves, no markings to match with a weapon if we ever find one.”

“Because muskets have no rifling to spin the bullet?” I asked.

“Correct,” Izzy replied. “Our little silver balls are as smooth as a baby’s nuts.”

Terrific. I asked Izzy if the feds were running down all the threats made to still-living politicians around the country. They were trying. The hotel rooms at the convention center were still crime scenes, because the FBI was slower than post office snail mail. They had not yet found any trace of the three bearded men who had followed me, and who were possibly from the APN militia in Brooklyn—which was still deserted—although the cops were still staking out the building for the feds. Meanwhile, NYPD was also still stuck guarding the crime scenes, while the hotel staff went slowly berserk, threatening to sue NYPD for lost revenue every day.

“The feds haven’t found the shooter of the other congressman in the crapper in Minnesota and half of the Senate is applying to the Witness Relocation program.” Izzy laughed. “The FBI has us babysitting the hotel, doing a few routine checks and door-knocks and not much else. I think they’re just trying to keep the secrets of dead congressmen. I don’t give a damn. If they let us loose, we’d get these motherfuckers.”

“Everything is awesome,” Phil sang in an odd voice. “Everything is cool when you’re part of a team.”

“What the hell was that?”

“
The Lego Movie
,” Phil answered.

“He’s got young kids,” Izzy explained.

“Speaking of the hotel, do you mind if I go back to the crime scenes and look around one more time this week?” I asked.

“Why?” Izzy asked, suspiciously.

I shrugged. “I must have missed something. And I’ve got nothing else to do. Except a column I’m supposed to write on how dogs can sense the earth’s magnetic field and only poop north to south.”

He said it was okay, as long as I kept it low key, wore gloves and was watched by the cops there at all times.

“No problem, thanks.”

“Sounds like you’re onto something with that magnetic crap idea,” Phil said, with a straight face.

We ran out of things to talk about. I asked casually if they had ever heard of Faith Potsoli Anthony. They laughed.

“What?”

“The last time you asked me about a girl, it was Ginny Mac,” Izzy said. “You didn’t listen to us about her and we all know how well that worked out.”

“I’m not dating Faith. She’s, like, twice my age. I just met her and I have a girlfriend,” I protested.

“And Tiffany has left town,” Phil added.

I ignored him.

“The latest I hear on Faith is that she is running your old newspaper while the boss Trevor Todd hides in New Zealand,” Izzy told me. “La Madrina is a very busy lady.”

“La Madrina?”

“The Godmother. After her dad croaked in jail, she took over the family business but we haven’t been able to prove that yet. Allegedly she now runs two organized crime groups; the Potsoli Family and the
New York Mail
. Why are you asking about her?”

“She offered me my job back. With a big raise.”

“And you didn’t take it?” Izzy asked.

“Nope.”

“What did I tell you, Phil? This guy is the gift that keeps on giving.”

“Totally awesome,” Phil said.

“Hey, Shepherd, don’t worry,” Izzy told me, lapsing into Spanish. “
Hombre prevenido vale por dos
.”

“Which means?”

“Threatened men live long.”

I wanted to order pizza but Jane insisted on cooking a real meal, some kind of chicken casserole and French potatoes with cheese. She was a bit miffed that I had also invited Amy and Sparky. She thought this would be a quiet dinner with my family but I knew it would only be quiet if there were other people around. I didn’t tell her I also invited Izzy and Phil but they were busy. The meal was terrific. I opened some wine and broke out a bottle of arak. Sparky and I did a few shots with the hors d’oeuvres and more with dinner. If Jane thought she was going to impress my mom, she was wasting her time. I never knew my mother to cook. My dad could do simple barbecue but he was also not a homebody. He never took me fishing or taught me baseball or changed a light bulb. You could say they rejected traditional gender and parental roles. Also, you could say they were completely absorbed in their own careers and spent more time with their students than with their only son. Jane gently drew out my dad, asking about his TV appearance and duel with the Conservative talk show host. He talked about his book and Jane seemed genuinely impressed.

After two glasses of wine, Jane told her story about the woman’s dog at the animal hospital who regurgitated the condom, which led the woman’s husband to conclude his wife was cheating on him. Surprisingly, my parents actually laughed out loud. Amy, who had also sampled the arak, giggled. Sparky roared with laughter, until tears rolled down his cheeks. He asked if we could do the dog/condom story for the newspaper.

“No way,” Jane told Sparky.

“But that’s a front page,” Sparky whined. “Dog fetches divorce! Hubby spies proof that hound found on ground!”

I had to change the subject to prevent him from blurting out other possible obscene headlines. It bugged Amy but I interested everyone with my discoveries about the silver coins. Everybody agreed that the obvious suspects were the Roehm brothers, along with their hired militia guns. Then I shared my frustrating chat with the cops, who had almost zilch.

“But if these brothers are going to finance a secret plan to kill their rivals and rig the election,” I asked, “why also donate huge sums to competing candidates, even some of the ones who were killed?”

“To allay suspicion now, so they can point to that when anyone questions them,” my father pointed out.

“Exactly,” my mother chimed in.

“I’m going to go over the scenes again,” I said. “Maybe we missed something.”

“Have the police and FBI already searched them for all possible evidence?” my father asked.

“Yes.”

“Then what will you achieve by going back there?” His voice was tinged with doubt. “Do you think
you
can find some vital clue they missed?”

His implication was obvious but I didn’t go for the bait.

“No, of course not,” I lied with a smile. “I just need to go over the ground again to get it all straight in my head.”

“That’s a good idea,” my mother surprised me by saying. With her next breath, she managed to turn it into a condescending statement.

“That’s very mindful. You’re a visual learner. It may help you reconstruct scenarios.”

“Then what?” Amy asked, sipping her wine.

“Then I talk to the Roehm brothers, as a
Daily Press
reporter,” I said. “And ask them if they’re the Tea Party Animals.”

“Francis, I hope your approach will be a bit more subtle.” My mother smiled.

“Oh yeah, I’ll ask him his favorite color first.”

“They’ll never talk to you,” Jane said.

“Only one way to find out,” I replied.

I was stunned to see my father help Jane clear the table and set up for coffee and dessert. My mom and Amy chatted in the living room. I had the odd feeling that they were all talking about me. I took Skippy outside for a walk and Sparky came along. It was a warm, calm night. I looked around—and up—but couldn’t spot any surveillance.

“Doesn’t mean anything,” Sparky pointed out. “Hey, check this out,” he said, opening the back doors of his van. “New toys.”

There were two large horizontal racks to hold two gigantic black octo-copter drones with mounted cameras.

“Wow,” I said.

“I’ve been making mega bucks from the pictures of Senator Hard-on. Thanks to you, amigo. I’m expanding my business, even hired a guy to run the van when I’m asleep. And these drones—they can lift almost a hundred pounds beyond their payloads. State of the fucking art, man.”

He pulled out his phone and showed me an incredible video taken by one of the drones—inside the Fourth of July fireworks over the East River. It was like nothing I had ever seen before and told him so.

“How big a deal is it to run a night mission with one of your drones?” I asked.

“Not a big deal at all, why?”

“Could you send one to 740 Park Avenue? I’d like to take a peek in the Roehm brothers’ penthouse.”

“Seriously?”

“Totally.”

Five minutes later, one of the drones was out of the van, onto the pavement and up, up and away. We got into the back of the van, into two swivel bucket seats. Skippy curled up underfoot. Sparky had multiple screens built in and we watched the sparkling skyline fly by in front of us.

“Don’t you have to keep it in sight?” I asked.

“Not with these beauties. They have three-dimensional GPS databases, ultrasound, night vision, collision avoidance, and lots more and are completely programmable. It knows where we are, where 740 Park Avenue is, the altitude of the building, everything. By the way, there is no other drone nearby. The system already looked. Here’s the building now.”

On the screens, there were views down to the street hundreds of feet below, where car and cab headlights moved, and also video ahead, of wide, stacked terraces of penthouses atop the building. One screen had data readouts of the address, latitude and longitude numbers, and the height of the structure at two hundred and fifty-six feet.

“The bird will hover over the street and never trespass,” Sparky said. “Let’s zoom in.”

The forward video zoomed in on the large penthouse windows, which were lit from within. I saw high ceilings, Scandinavian-style living rooms, dining areas, and an indoor fountain. In a large study, the wall was crowded with long brown tubes. He zoomed in more. Muskets, dozens of them, including flintlock pistols.

All the lights were on but nobody seemed to be home. Sparky circled around the building and scoped out the matching penthouse on the other side, which belonged to the other twin. The décor was different: glittering gold accents and crystal chandeliers. We couldn’t spot any coins until Sparky moved the drone upwards and shot downward. In the study there were rows of dark wood cabinets and gleaming glass tables. Inside, thousands of gold and silver discs. His coin collection. Again, no one was home.

Sparky sent the drone to the penthouse below, but all the lights were off, the curtains drawn. The penthouse above was lit, revealing early American furniture but modern paintings on the walls, a combination that to my eye didn’t work. Just because you had money didn’t mean you had taste.

When Jane came out to see what had become of us, we shut the recon mission down. “I recorded that, in case it was helpful,” Sparky told me.

“I don’t think so but hold onto it. It confirmed what I already knew they collected—rare guns and rare coins. And ugly furnishings.”

“Man, you may not like it but I bet every piece of furniture is worth more than we make in a year.”

“Yeah but remember, Sparky, money can’t buy happiness.”

“The fuck it can’t. You ever notice rich people never say bullshit like that? Only poor people.”

Jane was right. The Roehm brothers would not see me the next morning. They did business out of a giant skyscraper on Fifth Avenue with its own subway stop. It was easy to find, even for a new private detective like me, because three sides of the stone structure had
ROEHM BUILDING
chiseled into it in giant letters. After going through airport-level security and a search of my backpack, my Working Press pass only got me into a third-floor public relations office after waiting an hour. I told them I wanted to interview the brothers about current events. After a lot of BS, a very nice young blonde lady handed me a printed sheet with instructions on how to email my questions in advance to Roehm International. I asked her if it was worth the trouble. She looked around before answering in a hush.

“Not really. I’ve been here four years and they don’t talk to the press at all, unless they want to and then
they
call
you
. I’ve never actually met them. But it can’t hurt to leave your information. Maybe they’ll call.”