Cold Frame (32 page)

“This that Hiram Walker guy?”

“Yes, it is,” she said. Then before he could ask any more questions, she dropped the helmet visor and kicked the Harley into life. Then she accelerated out of the garage right into all the traffic on Thirty-third Street, to the accompaniment of many horns and screeching brakes. Almost immediately, a siren started up about a block away, then a second. He watched for a moment from the shadow of the garage entrance, then punched the door control to lower it. He heard the motorcycle's engine throttle down for a moment and then accelerate, probably turning onto M Street.

He went to the mountain bike and unchained it from its rack, checked the tires, and then looked at his watch. The towpath was pretty narrow right here in the Georgetown precincts, but it widened out upriver of Georgetown U. The traffic crossing the river on Chain Bridge would be heavy at this time of day, so walking the bike across would make sense. He found his bicycle helmet and put it on, which obscured his shaved head. The big football shirt would hide his holster and badge rig, and his phone and wallet could go in the bag behind the seat. He'd forgotten to bring sunglasses, but his helmet had an abbreviated sun visor, which would conceal at least the top of his face.

He rolled the bike toward the service door. Even through the three courses of old brick between him and the outside world, he thought he could still hear that helicopter, which sounded as if it was hovering right over the building now. Suppressed or not, its rotors punched a menacing staccato of pure military power down into the canal. Then the pitch changed and the noise began to diminish. The sirens became louder, and there was a lot of horn blaring out on the street, as if maybe the cop cars were trying to push through traffic and traffic was pushing back.

He waited a few more minutes for the sirens to go away, then rolled the bike through the service door, making sure it locked behind him, and, with a final deep breath, rolled it out of the building. He almost expected gunfire once out in the morning light, but there was only the usual traffic in the street. No helicopters or cop cars or Expeditions loitering in the shadows. They'd gone after the decoy, apparently. When he thought about it, he realized those vehicles had to have been there
before
the helo showed up. Had they seen her go into his building, and then made a move to get them both?

Them, again. They. Them. He shivered in the morning sunlight as he realized just how many of “them” were in this town these days.

As he pedaled up the towpath, being passed by the occasional runner and then having to stop, get off, and portage the bike up and over a street crossing and back down to the path again, he thought about the mysterious but damned exciting Ellen Whiting. Their bedroom encounter had been swift and urgent, at least the first time. Round two had been gentler but no less demanding on her part. Only afterward, when she'd rolled off into a warm ball alongside him, had he begun to wonder what the hell he'd gotten himself into. Was it as simple as what she'd said? Got some serious horns here? She probably thought he'd been gaming her a little—playing hard to get and thus arousing her interest. It had been months since he'd taken a woman to bed, and, in a way, he still hadn't—she had clearly taken
him
to bed, and she had been in control just about every time they'd met up.

A bell rang behind him and he pulled to the right just in time to let a speed bike whiz past on his left, about one foot away. He wondered what Ellen Whiting was doing right about now as she led an enraged federal posse into the red zone around the Mall, the White House, Ellipse, and all those tourist buses massing at the reflecting pool. Probably having the time of her life, he thought with a grin. He remembered what his father had called women like that: sport models. Then his grin faded as he remembered the old traffic cop refrain: you can outrun me, but you can
not
outrun my radio …

 

TWENTY-ONE

Hiram Walker looked up as Thomas came into the library to report that there was a man in a cab at the front gates asking to be admitted.

“What's his name?”

“Detective Sergeant Kenneth Smith, Washington Metro Police Department,” Thomas announced.

“Yes, let him in and bring him to me. See if he wants a coffee.”

Five minutes later Thomas ushered Av into the library and then went to get a coffee tray. Hiram stood up and offered an oversized hand. “Sergeant Smith,” he said, “welcome to Whitestone Hall. I'll bet you're wondering why she sent you here.”

“That's putting it mildly, Mister Walker. It's already been a pretty interesting morning.”

Hiram pointed to a chair and then sat back down on his “throne.” He was relieved to see that the policeman's feet actually did touch the ground. Av told him most of what had happened earlier, omitting the more personal activities.

“I received a brief text from Ellen,” Hiram said. “Saying you were coming and that she was going. Where, I don't know.”

“She's leading some federal LE on a wild-goose chase, I expect,” Av said, trying not to gawk at the giant sitting across from him. “They'll eventually catch her—it's a small town, after all—and then we'll see how good a bullshitter she really is.”

Hiram laughed. “A pretty good one, Sergeant,” he said. “But I believe her heart's in the right place and that there is a serious problem to deal with downtown.”

“That being the DMX?”

Hiram hesitated. Ellen had said that this policeman knew about the problem, but that he was absolutely
not
read into the DMX. The policeman smiled when he saw Hiram hesitate. “I know, Mister Walker, I know,” he said, as Thomas came in with the coffee tray. “And now you can guess what
my
problem is.”

Hiram nodded, waiting for Thomas to back out of the library. They fixed their coffees and then resumed their conversation. Hiram told Av about his having let some covert agencies use some of his more exotic plants, and that he now thought that Mandeville had really gained access to them in order to kill off his opposition on the DMX.

“Ellen told me that she was involved in the first one,” Av said. “We got a lot of smoke blown our way when we looked into the McGavin death. Even the ME drew a blank, or else somebody got to them. The Bureau said it wasn't their problem, and then it
was
their problem, and then—frankly, I'm completely confused at this juncture.”

Hiram said he understood. “The sheer size of the counterterrorism world down there is enough to make confusion the order of the day, I'm sure. I'd like to think that that is part of some grand strategy to confuse the enemy, but unfortunately, it's just Parkinson's Law. Ellen said you met Mister Mandeville under rather strange circumstances—do you think they were coming for you this morning?”

It was Av's turn to hesitate. He really didn't want to expose the fact that he and Ellen had gone to bed together, but if he said that they might have been after her instead of him, it would be pretty obvious. “I
think
they were coming for me,” he said. “I think Ellen had come to warn me—she's aware of Mandeville's crusade to do some ethnic cleansing—and then she decided to provide a decoy so I could get away. Before the helicopter showed up, she'd been telling me about you and that you might be able to explain what had happened to those people.”

Hiram put down his coffee cup and stood up. Ellen had told Av that Hiram was tall, but he'd had no idea. “I have to move around from time to time, Sergeant,” Hiram said. “With my condition there will come a time when I will be unable to move much at all. Care for a tour of my gardens?”

“Is it safe to tour your gardens?” Av asked, remembering Ellen's words.

Hiram smiled. “As long as you stay on the sidewalks near the house, Sergeant,” he said. “It can be a bit of a jungle out there, you know.”

*   *   *

They'd been outside for half an hour when Ellen finally showed up at the gates. She joined them outside, dressed now in her business clothes and driving a government sedan. Hiram had been explaining how plants process sunlight, water, and CO
2
to make food, and Av was glad for the distraction. She greeted Hiram with a warm smile and a quick handshake; with Av she was more reserved, which he thought was a little amusing, considering. But then, the previous few hours of her morning may have been a wee bit stressful.

“The sergeant tells me you've been having an adventure this morning,” Hiram said.

“Not for too long,” she said with a grin. “I took off on the sergeant's motorcycle as a distraction, and they went for it. I pretended not to notice the helicopter or any of the blue lights stuck in rush-hour traffic behind me. By the time they realized where I was headed, the sergeant here was probably crossing the river into Virginia.”

“Where'd you lead 'em?” Av asked.

“To the Hoover building, of course,” she said, innocently. “That's where I work.”

Av laughed. Hiram shook his massive head. “Do you know who ‘they' were, Ellen?” he asked.

“Nope,” she said. “Black vehicles, MPD, and the helicopter looked military but had no markings, although I didn't spend a lot of time staring at it. I did go across the Fourteenth Street Bridge to the Pentagon, circled through north parking and then up to the Arlington Cemetery boulevard, then back across the Memorial Bridge to the Hoover.”

“What happened then?”

“Went in the building, down to the gym facilities, got cleaned up, changed clothes, and then up to my office. Thirty minutes later, got a summons from Mister Miller, who wanted to know where I'd been earlier this morning. I told him, and then asked why he wanted to know.”

“What'd he say to that?” Av asked, wondering just how much she'd told Miller.

“Have a nice day?” she said. “As in, that's all, thank you. Then I came out here.”

“So if it wasn't the Bureau who was flying helicopters around the capital center this morning, who was it?”

“Beats me,” she said. “But since there were no heat-seeking missiles fired at it from the White House roof, it had to be federal
and
cleared in advance.”

“Is that something Mister Mandeville could arrange?” Hiram asked.

“Not on the spur of the moment,” Ellen said. “The airspace around the capital is closed to all traffic by a no-fly zone, deadly force authorized. He's senior enough to get it done, but it would be a protracted process, with lots of meetings and coordination.”

“I guess I could check with Metro PD's operations center,” Av said. “They'd have to be part of that process.”

“I think you need to stay off the electronic grid for a while,” Ellen said. “If that was Mandeville this morning, he won't quit, and he's got long arms.”

“I was just showing the sergeant around some of the gardens,” Hiram said, glancing up at the sky, as if looking for helicopters or other flying objects. “But perhaps we should go inside and discuss this matter further?”

Back in the house, Hiram had Thomas take them to his communications room, which was behind the library, while he tended to some medications.

“This is where he confers with the other members of the Phaedo Society,” Ellen said, as Av looked around at the big screens, now dark, and all the smaller displays, which seemed to be watching a laboratory of some kind, the estate's perimeter, and three screens of separate news stations. She then had to explain what the Phaedo Society was.

“Mister Walker must be fabulously wealthy,” Av commented. “This is a serious setup.”

“He never leaves this place,” she said. “Imagine that.”

Thomas came in and told them that Mister Walker would be with them shortly. Then he went to a console in one corner of the room and made several settings, some of which changed the perimeter security cameras' angle of view.

“Expecting company?” he asked, but Thomas did not respond. He completed his settings, asked if they needed anything, and then withdrew, closing the door behind him.

“Explain something to me, if you can,” Av said. “Rue Waltham?”

“Who's Rue Waltham?”

“The blond number who sounded the alarm this morning?”

Ellen shook her head. “No idea—I didn't see anyone else in the apartment.” As Av was about to object, Hiram came looking somewhat better than he had earlier.

“Sergeant,” he said. “Why don't you and Ellen here come with me to my laboratory,” he said. “I think I can get a better handle on what killed McGavin and Logan. I've asked a friend in the Bureau lab to get me copies of the OCME results on both victims.”

“They'll do that?” Ellen asked.

Hiram nodded. “I've worked with them from time to time, especially when they have an embarrassing toxicology mystery.”

“Actually, I can't stay,” Ellen said, looking at her watch. “I've got a pre-DMX meeting this afternoon and then I can come back. Can Sergeant Smith stay here until we can find out who that was this morning?”

Hiram nodded. “Certainly,” he said. “So the Bureau
will
be looking into it?”

“Maybe, maybe not,” she said. “If it was an apprehension mission coordinated by someone in the White House, then the rest of federal law enforcement might be studiously looking the other way.”

“Curiouser and curiouser,” Hiram said. “Well, the sergeant was closer to the McGavin investigation and autopsy than you were, so get back when you can, and, in the meantime, we'll go to the lab and see what we can see.”

“Right,” she said. “I'll try to get back by five. I'll call Thomas if I can
not
make it for some reason.” Then she turned to Av. “I think Mandeville knows you're not in Petersburg anymore and that you know too much. If he's willing to kill members of the DMX for disagreeing with him, he'll sure as hell be willing to ice you. You're safer here than anywhere else right now, but I'll know more this evening. Okay?”