An Absence of Light (27 page)

Burtell did not come out for fifteen minutes. When he did, it was Li who picked him up.

LI: “I’ve got him, Murray. He’s coming at me on Woodway.”

MURRAY: “Keep going. I’ll pick him up if he gets on the Loop. Remberto, come on in. Connie, turn off and wait for him. If he goes back west on Woodway one of you let me know who picks him up first.”

Silence again as the disrupted surveillance team rearranged itself to accommodate Burtell’s maneuver. Within seconds he had made another choice.

MURRAY: “Okay, he’s mine. He’s on the access road heading north. We’re going up on the Loop.”

Everyone followed, each at his own pace, from three different directions.

MURRAY: “We’re heading into the interchange. Going east into… Son of a bitch! Heading west! Heading west! I lost him. I lost him… He’s… Son of a bitch!”

REMBERTO: “It’s okay, Murray. I’ve got him. No problem.” The Bolivian’s voice was calm, undisturbed. “We’re on 1–10 heading west Somebody let me know when you’re in line behind me in case he goes to the access roads again.”

LI: “I’m five cars behind you, Rem.”

CONNIE: “I’m three behind Li.”

REMBERTO: “He’s braking… No—no… He’s going on. He’s moving way over left. Oh, man, picking up speed.”

CONNIE: “I’m in the left lane, Rem, but I’m too far back to identify him.”

REMBERTO: “He’s behind an RV, alternating red and orange lights… braking… braking.”

CONNIE: “Okay… I see him.”

REMBERTO: “Li stay right. I have a feeling he’s going to whip across traffic and exit as soon… There he goes!… There he goes! Gessner! Gessner!”

LI: “I’ve got him. Gessner exit.”

Remberto continued down the expressway past the exit.

MURRAY: Remberto, stay on the expressway. He could shoot back up. Connie, steady with traffic, I’m coming up on you. Li, what’s he doing? Come on! Come on, kid, what’s he doing?”

LI: “We’re going through the Gessner light… not turning off… The light caught me… I’m stopped, I’m stop—There he goes… he’s going back up… he’s going back up on 1–10… Shit! He’s flying, he’s cooking.”

CONNIE: “I’ve got him.” Like Remberto her voice was laid back, conversational. “He’s coming up on your tail, Remberto.”

REMBERTO: “He’s not leaving the right lane… Holy God… he’s going to run right up my tailpipe!”

MURRAY: “Watch him! He’s going to take the interchange… He’s going…”

At the last possible moment, just before Burtell rammed into the back of Remberto’s car, they came to the interchange exit and Burtell rocketed off to the right, careening into the climbing turn and, as he banked off the expressway onto the Sam Houston Tollway, headed south. It was too late for Connie to turn off, but Murray and Li both easily followed him in the flow of traffic. It was a good move, perfect timing to do what he did, an expert maneuver. Remberto and Connie would have to pass up the next exit to avoid having to brake quickly and possibly give themselves away to any countersurveillance. They would have to continue on to the next one, signaling, keeping cars between them, let a traffic light separate them, and then circle back on the access road to the interchange and join the tollway traffic behind the rest of them.

From here on Burtell played another kind of game. The tollway was wide, long, and straight, and Burtell tried to isolate himself. This was the tactic that Murray found the most difficult to deal with. The traffic here was more sparse, strung out on the newly completed tollway. Burtell slowed down and waited until a traffic cluster bypassed him, and he was fairly isolated on the long stretch of roadway. He drifted along and then suddenly pulled to the shoulder right before one of the exits that came at regular intervals. Anyone following him very closely would have to continue on the tollway and from his vantage point he could easily see the next two exits to identify any car that pulled off. He wouldn’t forget the make of anything that did.

MURRAY: “He’s pulled to the shoulder just past Richmond. He’s getting out, raising the hood of his car. Li, we’ll keep going. Remberto? Connie?”

CONNIE: “Exiting at Rodgerdale.” That was the exit a mile before Burtell. He would never even see them pulling off.

REMBERTO: “I’m behind her, getting off at Briar Forest.”

CONNIE: “On Rodgerdale, coming up on Richmond. I can see him up there, hood’s up… He’s looking down the tollway toward Li and Murray. Remberto. Get off in one of the neighborhood streets here. He’s right at an exit. I’m pulling over to a gas station.”

There was dead air for a while as Burtell continued to look down the tollway, watching the next two exits. Finally he closed the hood.

CONNIE: “Okay, he’s satisfied, putting down the hood he’s moving. Remberto, he’s pulling off right in front of me. He’s ducking under the tollway, going back… Okay, he’s turning under again… No, wait, no he was signaling but he’s not turning… He’s staying on Parkway… Parkway all the way.”

Burtell was good at what he was doing, keeping all four of his tails off balance, though none of them had been able to determine if he had even picked them up. From all indications he did not know they were there. Even so, the game continued, across the south side of the city through neighborhoods and expressways, through one, two, three, four, five massive interchanges that took them west and then north, suddenly cutting right to the heart of downtown and careening back out again on another angle to take them once again on 1–10 and, incredibly, once again onto the Sam Houston Tollway. Then to everyone’s amazement he suddenly pulled aside on the same overpass as before and lifted the hood of his car again.

This time it was Connie and Li who shot past him and Murray and Remberto who caught the stall on the access road. When Burtell got back into the car the second time, he pulled off on the access road, doubled back under the tollway, and headed into town on Richmond.

MURRAY: “Well, kids, this is looking different. Something’s up. Connie, Li, where are you guys?”

CONNIE: “We’re off the tollway at Bellaire headed for Southwest Freeway. Keep us posted, and we’ll intersect you as soon as we can.”

The drive down Richmond was without any evasive maneuvering by Burtell. He was a model driver, going exactly the speed limit, never going through an amber traffic light But this was deceivingly dangerous. Now they were down to only two vehicles, and they couldn’t stay on him long. Remberto passed him.

MURRAY: “We’re leading and following, Connie. Where are you?”

LI: “We’re hauling ass on Southwest. What’s your cross street?”

MURRAY: “Coming up on Ann Arbor. But he’s just puttering along.”

LI: “With luck we’ll see you at Chimney Rock.”

Which was exactly what happened. As soon as they came on Murray pulled off but Remberto remained in the lead. Nothing changed for another five minutes, Burtell the model driver staying with the flow of traffic which had gotten increasingly sparse. Then:

CONNIE: “He’s turning left on Sage.”

Connie, behind him, and Remberto, ahead of him, kept going. Li fell in behind him, but dropped way back because the street was almost deserted. In front of them only blocks away was the Galleria complex and slightly to their right the Transco Tower and its attendant fountain and park. Burtell turned right on Hidalgo and pulled to the side of the street across from the Transco Fountain. Li and Murray both continued by out of sight, and then Murray doubled back and entered Sage himself. He also turned on Hidalgo, but drove by and turned onto Post Oak and then into Bercher, where he parked.

MURRAY: “Be damned. He’s going to the fountain.” He looked at his watch. Burtell’s evasive maneuvers had lasted a marathon hour and five minutes.

The Transco Tower was the tallest office building outside downtown, a perfectly symmetrical tower of sixty-four stories topped by a rotating beacon that was lighted every night from dusk to midnight and was powerful enough to be seen twenty miles away. On the south side of the tower was a long, mall-like park having a sunken lawn with grassy slopes. At the end of the lawn was the Transco Fountain, a granite wall several stories high and ten or twelve feet thick built in a half circle and facing the tower. Water gushed out of the top of the wall and fell down the sheer, grooved sides of the granite semicircle in thin roiling sheets to a stepped stone base and pool. Standing on the inside of the semicircle, as the water thundered and sprayed around you, produced the strange sensation of levitation.

A few feet away from the fountain another wall stood between the fountain and the lawn, a neoclassical facade with three Roman arches through which the lower portion of the lighted fountain could be viewed from the lawn. In the evenings the lighted fountain and sloping sides of the sunken lawn were a favorite site for strollers, Frisbee-throwers, and families who let their children play along the long, grassy slopes that were lighted obliquely from the rippling reflections off the fountain.

By the time Burtell got out of his car and started walking casually toward the fountain and the scores of milling people along the mall and around the fountain, Murray’s drivers had parked at strategic places on opposite sides of the fountain complex, watching Burtell work his way slowly into the crowds.

MURRAY: “Everybody stay put There are a lot of people out there, but not enough. We’d need a swarm of people to keep from getting nailed. Boyd, Cheryl. How you guys lined up?”

CHERYL: “If they don’t go to the fountain I think I’ll be able to pick them up okay.”

BOYD: “I’m okay for now.”

MURRAY: “Okay, go ahead and shoot.”

Burtell strolled to the sidewalk that ran around the perimeter of the sunken lawn and began walking around it, beginning on the west side of the water curtain. As he walked he took something out of his suit coat pocket and began to eat.

MURRAY: “What the hell’s that?”

BOYD: “Looks like peanuts.”

MURRAY: “Peanuts?”

BOYD: “No, sunflower seeds.”

MURRAY: “Well, shit, which is it?”

BOYD: “Sunflower seeds. He’s cracking the hulls and spitting them out.”

MURRAY: “Jesus, that’s a good camera, hotshot.”

BOYD: “Yeah.”

Burtell walked around the entire lawn perimeter, stopping now and then to watch the kids rolling down the grassy slopes, looking up at the tower light, eating sunflower seeds, pausing, looking the length of the sunken lawn to the fountain. People milled all around him, a Frisbee sailed perilously close. He didn’t speak to anyone. He was totally relaxed.

MURRAY: “Anybody see anything?”

No one responded. Burtell had almost made it back to the fountains approaching its east side, when a man in a suit joined him. Together they walked up the steps to the inner curve of the fountain curtain.

MURRAY: (excited) “Where the fuck he come from?”

CHERYL: “Goddamn it… I knew it, I knew they were going to do that.”

MURRAY: “Boyd!”

BOYD: “I’m shooting… I’m shooting.”

CHERYL: “I can shoot this, Murray, but the water’s going to screw it up. I can’t filter out the goddamned water… It’s not going to work.”

MURRAY: “You getting anything?”

CHERYL: “Snatches… here and there… Oh, wait They’re behind the… you know, columns… I can only shoot the sound if they’re in the open, under the arches. They’re walking in and out of the arches.”

MURRAY: “Boyd.”

BOYD: “Same here. I’m shooting, but they’re moving in and out of sight.”

MURRAY: “What’s he look like?”

BOYD: “He’s an
old
guy.”

MURRAY: “Old?”

BOYD: “God, he must be fifty, late fifties.”

MURRAY: “Shit, kid.”

Murray could hear them laughing.

Burtell and his companion walked back and forth the entire rime they were at the fountain. By Murray’s watch it was a thirty-two-minute meeting. They walked back and forth for thirty-two minutes inside the misty half circle of the water curtain, during which time Cheryl cursed intermittently and Boyd said, “Got ‘em… got’ em… got ‘em…” each time they stepped under one of the Roman arches.

Suddenly, without any body language that indicated they were finished talking, they parted, each exiting opposite sides of the fountain.

LI: “Murray. The guy’s heading down the slope to a car fifty yards in front of me. Do I go with him?”

MURRAY: “Not part of the deal, kid. Tell you what, though. Pull out and go down to the parking lot of that dorky restaurant at Westheimer. Catch his license plate. Okay, people. Heads up, here we go.”

Within three minutes they were coordinating their moves again.

LI: “Murray. Sorry, I don’t know, I guess I missed him somehow.”

MURRAY: “Figures.”

Paula sat in the passenger seat and used a flashlight to locate Valerie Heath’s address on the Key Map while Neuman drove, heading south out of the city on the Gulf Freeway toward Galveston. It seemed that Heath and Sheck both lived in the same area on Houston’s extreme southeastern edge, a suburban sprawl of several incorporated cities that had grown up around NASA’s Johnson Space Center and the shores of Clear Lake which was connected to Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico by a narrow, crooked channel. In recent years Clear Lake had become a burgeoning sport and recreational playground for Houstonians who migrated from the city to the area’s numerous yacht clubs, marinas, and restaurants.

Valerie Heath lived on a peninsular development across the lake from two of the larger yacht clubs, not far from the channel that led into Galveston Bay. The peninsula had been scored with canals along either side of which homes had been built with individual docks for each house. The streets in front of the houses ran straight into the mainland.

They found the street Heath lived on, and Neuman slowed to a crawl as they looked at the addresses perfectly stenciled on the curbs in front.

“Jesus,” Neuman said as they eased past the spotless lawns, the magnolias and palms and sprays of oleanders. “This isn’t the kind of neighborhood I’d expect a couple of hardworking secretaries to be able to afford on sharesies.”

“Oh, really?” Paula said. “You would know?”