The Patriots Club (18 page)

“I’m in . . .” Bolden hesitated before revealing his location. It would only be a matter of time until de Valmont learned about Sol Weiss’s death. Bolden didn’t want him phoning the NYPD saying he’d just talked to the alleged murderer, who had admitted to being inside the New York Public Library. “I’m at Grand Central,” he said.

“Give me a few minutes, say half an hour, and call back. But do me a favor and get a better connection than this.”

“You can’t look now? It’s an emergency.”

“ ‘Fraid not. J. J.’s been yelling for me. Bye-bye.”

Bolden hung up, then hurried back to the reading room. At his desk, he stared at the prompt on the computer screen. For the heck of it, he typed in “Bobby Stillman.” There were lots of Robert Stillmans, but no Bobbys. Pushing back his chair, he walked to the periodicals desk. “I need to do a search on a company,” he said, when the assistant came to serve him. “Scanlon Corporation. I’d like to look in
The Wall Street Journal,
the
Army Times, Fortune,
and
Forbes
. How much will that run me?”

“How far back?”

“Nineteen seventy-five.”

“I’ll need a minute to check that we have microfilm on all those.
Army Times
might be iffy.”

The periodicals desk was located at the near end of the room, in a three-sided pen that abutted the wall. The archway to the main reading room stood adjacent to it. As Bolden waited for the woman to calculate the cost of his request, he found himself looking at two men who had just entered the room. Clean-cut, dressed in blazers and slacks, they stood on either side of the door, finding their way.

“Sir?”

“Yes,” said Bolden, returning his attention to the woman.

“You’ll be happy to know we have the
Army Times
. The total will be twelve seventy-five. Three dollars for each search, plus tax. For twenty dollars, we can run a LexisNexis search. It’s much more comprehensive. “

Bolden counted out seven dollars from his wallet. “I’ll just take two searches: the
Times
and
The Wall Street Journal
.”

“I’ll have your change in a moment.”

“Sure thing,” said Bolden distractedly. He was interested in the two men. Instead of walking to a free computer or proceeding to one of the reference desks, they remained rooted to the spot, their heads slowly scanning the cavernous room. Bolden shifted his gaze to the opposite archway, perhaps two hundred feet away. Two men, dressed similarly in casual business attire, had taken up position just inside the arch. They sported the same short haircuts, the same watchful attitude.

Bolden lowered his face. It couldn’t be. There was no way anyone could have traced him to the library. He hadn’t been followed. He hadn’t checked, but he’d been sure he was alone when he left Jenny’s school. He had no doubt that he’d been alone inside the clothing store.

“Here you are, sir. Sixty-six cents change.”

And then he saw it. The man nearest him inclined his head toward his lapel and whispered a few words. Bolden tensed. His ears stopped up and he swallowed to clear them.
Move,
a voice commanded him.
Get out now. They’ve seen you.

“Sir? Are you all right?”

Bolden bent over the counter. “Can you show me to the bathroom?” he asked with a pained expression. He held his hands to his stomach and winced. “I’m not well. I need to get there quickly.”

“Why, of course. It’s just outside the main reading room, sir. Don’t you worry.”

The librarian came to his side of the counter and took his arm. Together, they walked out of the computer room, brushing past the men positioned on either side of the passage. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught one of the men giving him the once-over.

Bolden shook free his arm and ran. He didn’t look behind him. He had ten steps, no more. He dashed across the main reading room, up the wide center aisle, past table after table, his tread thundering on the parquet floor. Everywhere heads turned to him. Voices called, “Quiet!” and “Slow down!” But when he cocked an ear behind him, he heard footsteps behind him, gaining.

He sprinted out of the main reading room, continuing across the rotunda to the top of the marble stairs. At the far side of the great hall, one of the men from the second team consulted with another, then began to run toward him. Bolden attacked the staircase recklessly, taking three or four stairs at a time. If he stumbled, he’d risk a broken ankle at best, and more probably a broken neck. Making the turn on the second-floor landing, he caught sight of his pursuers. Two of the men rushed down the stairs behind him. The other team started down the far staircase.

Breathing hard, he reached the ground floor. He heard a shout and saw a man tumbling head over heels down the far staircase. His eyes darted to the main entrance. Five sets of double doors governed entry and exit to the library. If only he could get outside, he might have a chance. He checked over his shoulder. The two behind him were rounding the last flight. One had unbuttoned his jacket and Bolden caught a glint of blue steel inside. He had to decide on a path. He slowed, hesitating when he could not afford to. He looked back at the main entrance. It couldn’t be. The same beefy shoulders, the neck corded with steel. The fanatical glare.

Wolf saw him at the same moment, and immediately the man broke into a run, arms pumping like a sprinter.

Bolden ran in the opposite direction, toward the rear of the library and the warren of corridors that housed the administrative offices and scholars’ reading rooms. He charged down one corridor, then made a sharp left down another. Doors on either side were stenciled with names and titles. A woman exited an office ahead of him, her head buried in her papers. Bolden crashed into her, sending her slamming into a wall. He stopped to help her up, then ducked into her office and shut the door. A young, bookish man sat at his PC, jaw agape, staring at him.

“Can you lock it?” Bolden demanded. When the man didn’t answer, he yelled, “Can you lock it?”

“Turn the dead bolt.”

Bolden slipped the dead bolt into place, then walked past the stunned man, into the adjoining office. A broad sash window gave onto the library’s café and Bryant Park, a wide expanse of snow-covered grass extending the width of the block. Bolden grasped the window’s handle and turned. It was stuck. There was pounding at the door. Wrapping his fingers around the handle, he turned it with all his might. The handle budged. With a yank, the window opened.

Behind him, the door burst in, exploding in a shriek of splintered wood. There came the sound of glass breaking and of objects toppling to the floor. The young man shouted in protest.

Bolden dropped to the ground ten feet below, landing on a dining table, slipping and crashing to the ground. Standing, he stumbled again, this time on an island of ice, then finally found his footing and ran into the park.

Wolf slipped his legs over the sill and jumped to the table. He landed poorly, his right knee bowing, and collapsed onto the ground.

Daring a look over his shoulder, Bolden saw him try to stand, then fall back to the ground.

Bolden did not stop until he’d left the park and reached Sixth Avenue. Even then, he walked briskly, keeping an eye behind him.

How?
he asked himself.
How did they find me?

29

Ellington Fiske walked up the stairs leading to the United States Capitol. “What’s wrong here?” he asked the horde of men surrounding him.

“Mike’s on the fritz,” said one.

“Something’s gone south with the wiring,” said another.

“Where’s my chief electrician?”

“On the dais,” someone else answered.

Fiske pushed his way through them, counting members of the Capitol Police, Park Police, a member of the Presidential Inaugural Committee, and a pair of full-bird colonels attached to the Military District of Washington. He stopped when he reached the spot where the President would be sworn in and deliver the inaugural address.

Behind him, risers had been set on the stairs leading up to the Capitol esplanade. Rows of chairs, all of them numbered, were neatly in place. There was room for approximately one thousand invited guests. Each had to present a ticket and identification. That went for the chief justice of the Supreme Court on down to Senator McCoy’s four-year-old nephew.

“Who’s looking for me?” A stout, unshaven man in blue overalls and a ratty parka presented himself. “Mike Rizzo,” he said, holding up his credentials. “You’re here about the microphone?”

“That’s correct,” said Fiske. “If it’s broken, why don’t you just replace it? Unscrew the damn thing and stick on a new one.”

“Doesn’t work that way,” said Rizzo. “The microphone’s built into the podium. It’s integrated into the body of the lectern itself. Actually, there are four directional mikes built into it, each the size of a postage stamp.” He shrugged to show he wasn’t too impressed. “The latest and greatest.”

Fiske ran a hand around the edges of the podium. It was impossible to even see the mike.

Jesus . . . for want of a nail . . .

The rain was falling harder now, fat little bombs that exploded on his cheeks. The forecast called for it to worsen during the night, and possibly turn to snow. He made a mental note to double-check with D.C. traffic authority and have all snowplow drivers on call. “Will somebody please get the protective canopy in place?” he shouted.

Planning for the inauguration had begun in earnest twelve months earlier. Fiske had broken down the security work into nine operational areas: intelligence; explosives and hazardous materials; legal; emergency response; credentialing; site-specific; multiagency communications, or MACC; transportation; and aviation. The problem of the podium fell into the site-specific committee’s purview. “Site-specific,” as the name implied, was tasked with physically outfitting the Capitol for the event. That meant installing all seating, supervising placement and construction of the television tower, setting up an area for the press pool, and making sure all electrical fixtures functioned properly.

A dead mike when the President was swearing her Oath of Office was the
second
worst thing that could happen tomorrow morning.

Fiske circled the lectern. It was no different from the one the President used at any outdoor function. A wood base led to a navy blue lectern with the presidential seal attached by magnets. It was manufactured in Virginia from Georgia maple, Chinese fiberboard, and Indian plastic. That was as close to American-made as anything came these days. He looked around him. Giant American flags hung from the walls of the Capitol. A blue carpet ran from the podium up the stairs. He was happy to note that it was still covered with plastic. Ballistic glass ran the perimeter of the balcony and on either side of the reviewing stand. His eye darted to the strategic spots on the Capitol roof where his snipers would take up position. Out of public sight behind them, batteries of “Avenger” antiaircraft guns had been installed. TelePrompTer reflectors stood to either side of the lectern. He had no doubt that they worked.

Fiske turned and looked out toward the Washington Monument. Twenty yards away, the skeleton of the TV tower rose, partially blocking his view of the Mall. The long promenade was a splotchy brown, the dormant grass patched with melting snow. The Mall was utterly vacant, except for pairs of policemen (some his own men) patrolling the fences set up to regulate the crowds. In twenty-four hours, rain or shine, over three hundred thousand people would crowd the area. Americans eager to witness the most solemn rite in their country’s historical pageant. The swearing in of the forty-fourth President of the United States.

“Isn’t there any way we can change out the mike?” Fiske asked Rizzo.

“Only one,” volunteered a new voice. It belonged to a young man, white, clean-cut, bland. “Bill Donohue. Triton Aerospace. We built the podium. The only way to get around using that mike is to go into the repair panel and cut the wires. Then put an external unit on top.”

“An external unit?” asked Fiske.

“Yes sir, you know, a regular microphone. We can drill a hole and run the cable inside the podium and hook it up to the PR system.”

Fiske smiled and shook his head, as if this young pup Donohue were trying to pull a fast one on him.
An external mike.
A big black banana that would stick up in the middle of Senator McCoy’s face as she spoke to 250 million Americans and billions of others around the world. Senator McCoy standing all of five feet four inches tall with heels. That was not a solution. Not unless Ellington Fiske wished for an immediate transfer to the Sierra Leone field office.

“Anything new from intel?” Fiske asked Larry Kennedy, his assistant.

Intelligence was charged with monitoring any leads from the CIA, FBI, DIA, or any credible law-enforcement agency pertaining to any and all possible threats. Anything from a concerted terrorist action to a lone gunman. For two hours tomorrow, the front steps of the Capitol would be the world’s biggest bull’s-eye. It would also be the world’s hardest target.

“Negative,” said Kennedy.

“Mr. Donohue,” barked Fiske.

“Yes sir.”

“Do you have another podium ready for us?”

“Yes, Mr. Fiske. It’s being prepped at the warehouse in McClean right now. Should be here at four o’clock. They’re just applying the presidential seal.”

“Get it here by two.” Fiske stomped away from the podium. “And be sure you test it first. I want to make sure the thing is working before we install it. Call me when it arrives.”

Fiske stared up at the sky. Policing three hundred thousand people in a pouring rain would make things decidedly more difficult. If the podium was his only problem, he’d get away easy. A sudden burst of rain drenched his face. “Where’s the canopy?” he asked no one in particular. “The first female President of the United States is going to be sworn in within twenty-four hours and she will not have a lousy hairdo. That woman is going to look good.”

30

Whenever John Franciscus entered the shimmering, bustling, Plexiglas world of 1 Police Plaza, the headquarters of the New York City Police Department in downtown Manhattan, he whispered the same moldy adage to himself: “Those that can, do. Those that can’t, man a desk at One PP.” To his way of thinking, cops policed. Which meant they knocked heads and solved crimes. The suits down here . . . well, they were just that . . .
suits
. Men who viewed police work as a ladder to the exalted lofts of city power. Who ordered their day according to the clock, not according to the cases open on their desks. Who took no pride in the wearing of a blue uniform. He’d seen them squirming in their dress blues on St. Patty’s Day, yanking at their high collars, adjusting their watch caps, and generally looking three shades of embarrassed.

Franciscus felt his cheeks flush. It wasn’t right, he cursed silently, keeping his eyes down so no one would think he was crying. It just wasn’t right. But when the anger waned, he couldn’t explain what it was, exactly, that wasn’t right, or why it had bothered him so much.

Records had changed floors, but the lights were still too bright and the ceilings too low. A chubby Hispanic man with thinning hair and a push broom mustache sat behind the long chest-high counter, reading a magazine.

“Matty L.,” said Franciscus as he passed through the door. “Can’t get rid of you either?”

“Gentleman Johnny Fran! What brings you to this fluorescent shithole?”

The two shook hands, and Franciscus found himself not wanting to let go. Lopes had occupied the desk next to him at Manhattan North for twenty years before catching a bullet in the spine during a botched arrest. A year in rehab and a Purple Shield medal awarded by the mayor himself in a ceremony at Gracie Mansion had landed him on this swiveling stool supervising Records. Behind his back, everyone called Lopes “Sticky Fingers.” Word was he’d dropped his piece going in for the bust that fateful day.

“I’m checking up on a cold case,” said Franciscus. “Goes way back. Nineteen-eighty.”

“Nineteen-eighty? That’s the Ice Age.”

“Double homicide up in Albany. You may know it.”

“Got the victims’ names?”

“Brendan O’Neill and Samuel Shepherd.”

“Guardian Bombing,” said Lopes, not missing a beat. “Who doesn’t remember it? Whole state was in an uproar.”

Lopes was right about that. It had been an electrifying crime. At the time, though, Franciscus was out of state, interviewing a suspect in a multiple homicide and hadn’t caught the climax on live TV like twenty million other New Yorkers. Before coming downtown, he’d read a few articles about the case that had appeared in the
Times
and the local Albany
Times Union
. These were the facts, as reported:

At 11:36
P.M.
, July 26, 1980, a powerful bomb blew up the headquarters of Guardian Microsystems, a maker of computer chips and software in Albany. Bomb experts estimated that over two hundred pounds of TNT packed inside two Samsonite suitcases were placed next to the first-floor R and D laboratory and detonated by remote control. Police tracked the explosives to a theft the week earlier from a nearby construction site. Two witnesses were found who reported seeing a suspicious U-Haul rental truck circling Guardian’s headquarters the day before the explosion. A check of the local U-Haul agency led police to the residence of David Bernstein, a respected law professor, better known as Manu Q, self-styled revolutionary and spokesman for the radical Free Society.

As officers O’Neill and Shepherd approached the house to question Bernstein, gunfire erupted. O’Neill and Shepherd were shot and died at the scene. A SWAT team was called in, and when Bernstein refused to surrender, the house was stormed.

News of a fugitive suspect surfaced a few weeks afterward, when a second set of fingerprints was discovered on the handgun used to kill O’Neill and Shepherd. The prints reportedly belonged to Bobby Stillman, a.k.a. Sunshine Awakening, a known member of the Free Society, and Bernstein’s common-law wife. Her involvement in the bombing was corroborated by witnesses who reported seeing her near the construction site where the dynamite used in the bombing had been stolen.

But Franciscus wasn’t interested in what the newspapers had to report. He wanted to learn what the homicide dicks had to say about the case. The good stuff never made it to the paper.

“Why you calling it a cold case?” asked Lopes. “They nailed the guy who offed the cops. His name was Bernstein. Guy was bananas. Called himself Manu Q. I remember like it was yesterday. Shot him like forty times. They posted his picture in the
Gazette
.”

Franciscus recalled the picture. The corpse had looked like a piece of Swiss cheese. Cop killers didn’t deserve any better. “There was a second suspect,” he said. “A woman who got away.”

“I don’t remember that. And she’s still running?” Lopes’s eyes narrowed in disgust. “All this time and no one’s nailed her? Shame on us. What’s her name?”

“Bobby Stillman, but she’s got more aliases than Joe Bananas.”

“Give me five minutes.” Lopes walked the length of the counter, tapping his fingers as he went. “I’ll pull the file. Original’s in Albany, but we’ll have an abstract.”

Franciscus sat down in the corner of the little waiting area they’d set up. A coffee table offered a few magazines. He skimmed through a month-old
Newsweek,
then checked what was on TV. A television in the corner was broacasting
The View
. Five broads yakking about why they never got laid. The guys at the squad room watched it every day. Kinda made sense, Franciscus decided, giving himself over to the show. It wasn’t exactly like cops wanted to sit around watching reruns of
NYPD Blue
. They had enough of that shit parked in front of them.

After a few minutes, he checked his watch, wondering what was taking so long. The watch was a gold-plated Bulova with a fake alligator strap, a gift to recognize thirty years on the job. The dial was embossed with the symbol of the New York City Police Department. He tapped the crystal with his thumb, as if to make sure the watch was keeping proper time. Once, he’d calculated that he’d spent over two thousand hours on stakeouts.

It seemed like only yesterday that he’d graduated from the academy and gone to his first posting with the tactical squad, busting up riots, demonstrations, sit-ins, and the like. It was 1969, and the world was going apeshit. Vietnam. Women’s lib. Free sex. Everyone shouting, “Turn on, tune in, and drop out.” The last thing anyone wanted to be was a monster in a blue uniform donning full riot gear, but Franciscus had signed on, and that’s what he did. No questions. No complaints. He’d always thought it was an honor to serve.

For the second time in an hour, his cheeks flushed and the back of his neck heated up. He looked up at the television to gather himself, but Barbara Walters was so blurry that not even another face-lift could straighten her out. Franciscus looked away, pinching his nose between thumb and forefinger. Going all fuzzy twice in the same day. What the heck was the matter with him? He fished a hankie out of his pocket and blew his nose.

Just then, he heard a welter of voices raised in heated argument from the back of the storeroom. A minute later, Matty Lopes reappeared. “I can’t believe it,” he said. “File’s gone.”

Franciscus stood and walked to the counter. “Someone check it out?”

“No, man. It’s like ‘gone’ gone. The whole thing has been ripped out of its folder. Like ‘stolen’ gone. I called Albany. Same thing. Gone. Not even an update slip. Nothing. Just ‘gone.’ ”

“Since when?”

“I got no idea. No one’s got any idea. The thing’s just gone. You sure you telling me everything about this case?”

“Cross my heart.” Franciscus was thinking that every case, both open and closed, belonged to someone and was registered as such on the central computer. “Who was the catching detective?”

“You want, let’s check.” Lopes unlatched a waist-high gate and waved him through. “Come on back. I’m pissed, let me tell you. This is my house. Nobody takes my stuff without asking.”

Franciscus followed him past the rows of shelves stuffed to the ceiling with case files. One day, they would all be scanned and stored on the mainframe, but that day was still a way off. At the back of the room, there was a table with five desktop computers. Instructions for their use were taped to the wall. Lopes sat down and motioned for Franciscus to take the place next to him. Consulting a scrap of paper, he keyed in the case file number.

“Theodore Kovacs,” said Lopes, when the information had appeared. “Died 1980. Three months after the bombing.”

“How old was he?”

“Thirty-one.”

“Young to have his gold shield. What was the cause?”

“Special circumstances.”

Franciscus traded glances with Lopes. “Special circumstances” was department shorthand for suicide. In copspeak, Theodore Kovacs had eaten his gun. “Jeez,” he muttered. “Who was the backup?”

It was also a rule that two detectives had to sign off on a case.

“That’s it. Just Kovacs.” Lopes pointed at the screen for Franciscus to take a look.

“Come on,” said Franciscus, sliding back his chair. “Can’t file without two names. You going to tell me that someone broke into the computer and stole that, too?”

For once, Matty Lopes didn’t have an answer. Shrugging, he shot Franciscus an earnest look. “Seems like this case ain’t so cold after all.”