New England White (53 page)

He caught the reproach in Julia’s eyes. “Come on, Jules. How many times have you said to me that neither party really cares about the darker nation any more? How all the Republicans care about is cutting taxes and building up the military, and all the Democrats care about is abortion and gay rights? Isn’t that what you always say, at least in private? Well, our hypothetical fixer and his club happen to agree with you. They don’t think the identity of the party in power makes a dime’s worth of difference in the lives of African Americans. All that matters to them is whether the people in power are people over whom they hold some influence.”

“Do you agree?” she asked, voice very small. “Do you think he’s right?”

“I see his point. Let’s leave it at that.” He was tying his tie. He could tell she remained unsatisfied. “Jules, look. Suppose you could prove who killed her. I don’t think you could, but suppose it was possible, after all these years. Suppose you could prove it, make the evidence public, and put him in prison for life. Would that bring the dead girl back? Would that help our people?” A stern shake of the head, in case she had failed to guess the right answer. “No, Jules. No. This is the only way that makes sense. It’s the only way in which justice actually accomplishes something other than allowing us to pat ourselves on the back. It’s less emotionally satisfying—there’s no catharsis—but it does some good for real people.”

He slipped into his jacket, turned this way and that in the mirror, watching how the soft wool fell.

“Lemmie, no. You can’t just stop there.”

“I’ve already said more than I should.”

“Please. There’s Jock’s confession. Did he really kill her? Or was he the boyfriend, just drunk in the back seat?”

“What difference does it make?”

“Your fixer might have been blackmailing two men for the same crime!”

“Twice the justice, don’t you think?”

She shook her head. “I think it was Scrunchy. I think it was always Scrunchy. I think Jock’s confession was the cover. What Merrill Joule called pointing everybody in the wrong direction. I think the reason Mona had one was that somehow, among the elite, there are people who know the truth, and if anybody gets too close, they’re supposed to let them stumble on Jock’s confession as a way to throw them off the scent.” She stood up, still not dressed for work. “I think—if Scrunchy did it?—I hope he’s suffering. He deserves to suffer.”

“It doesn’t matter who did the deed. Not really. I’ll tell you something, Jules. They were all guilty. They were rich, drunken frat boys. All humans are mortal and imperfect, they grow up, and they grew into reasonably upstanding men. That’s fine. But you asked me about the past. Fine. Let’s talk about the past. They were monsters. They did what they wanted and assumed somebody else would clean up the mess. Because of who they were, somebody else usually did. They shared this attitude—most Caucasians do, at least in America, but the rich ones especially, no matter where they stand on the political spectrum—I see it every day on campus from the folks on the Left, and I see it every day in Washington from the folks on the Right—anyway, they had this attitude of being aggrieved. The world had given them everything, but they seemed to think they were due even more. Somebody had hurt them. Somebody had taken something they had, or denied them something they coveted. They sit around and reinforce each other’s sense that the bad people are out there trying to steal their toys.” He had crossed to the window. Fluffy snowflakes tumbled. In his mind he was far away. “And I’ll tell you something else. I didn’t create this plan. I didn’t know anything about it. When I first heard about it—a year ago?—I thought it was—nuts. Illegal, certainly; immoral, probably; but definitely nuts. I even talked to some of the people on the Council about putting a stop to it. The Grand Paramount took me aside. Think about it, he said. A lot of effort has gone into this. A lot of thought. I still thought it was wrong, Jules. Now, though, I’m not so sure. Nowadays, when I look around, when I listen to what our elites babble about, in a country where solving the problems of race and class was once central to our politics, when I see how the paler nation has moved on to other issues and left the darker nation behind? Nowadays, I think our hypothetical fixer might have a point about America—”

He went out.

Julia, alone with her thoughts, was not prepared to deal with abstractions. She remained stuck on more concrete problems, such as who killed Gina Joule. She wondered who her husband was protecting. Confessions could be forged. Confessions could be coerced. No matter how much evidence pointed at Jock or Scrunchy, she could not get over the strong impression that Maureen Whisted, downstairs in the study the night of the dinner, was terrified that Kellen’s inventory would prove that her husband had done it.

CHAPTER 60

COMPARATIVE AUTHORITY

(I)

B
RUCE
V
ALLELY WAS
in a dark Buick Century, his official car, having found a parking spot on Hudson Street with a clear view of the entrance to the divinity school. He drummed his fingers on the wheel, watching the door through the fresh fluffy flakes because this was the only exit he had ever observed Julia using. He gave no thought to the peculiar racial inversion of the moment—a black cop wanting to find out why a white man was following a black woman—but had decided nevertheless that it was time he had a little talk with Mr. Flew. To ask him, say, to account for his whereabouts between eight and ten on the night Kellen Zant was shot. Or whether he might have been at the shopping mall in Norport the day Boris Gibbs got himself run over.

But, even more than he wanted to solve the crime, he wanted to figure out how on earth a man like Lemaster Carlyle wound up employing a Jeremy Flew; for the notion that Flew had tumbled into the job by splendid coincidence was too much to bear.

Action.

Julia came striding down the front steps in the company of a pair of students, who said their laughing goodbyes and trudged off toward the main campus. Julia stood for a moment, head moving as if to survey the street, and perhaps, consciously or not, she was doing exactly that. After a while, even the brain of an amateur senses surveillance. When her gaze moved over his car, he was careful to remain perfectly still, because ducking or turning his face away would only draw her attention.

She looked pale. Worried. Even frightened. Well, who wouldn’t be, with all the burdens she was carrying?

At last she set off toward the lot, drawing her scarf tightly around her neck. She climbed the three steps up to the poorly plowed tarmac, slipping twice on her way to the Escalade.

Bruce turned to look at Kepler again, and, sure enough, there was little Flew, emerging from the side entrance, out of sight of the front door, circling toward the parking lot. Bruce had a quick decision to make. He could stop the presidential assistant right here and question him, leaving Julia to make her own way without the tail, or he could follow Flew as he followed Julia. But he had a hunch that Jeremy Flew, former roving consultant for the State Department, would spot him in traffic. Better to put an end to the mess right here. Still, Bruce was not about to underestimate his suspect. From the glove box he took his Smith Wesson 64 and slipped it into his non-regulation belt holster. He opened the door slowly, for once thankful for the great white feathery silence of swiftly falling snow, and trotted along the buried pathway behind Kepler Quad.

Julia was almost at her car, head down, face pale, rushing and half stumbling, as if something had panicked her. He wondered if Flew noticed. He wondered if Flew was the cause.

Sprightly Flew, on the other hand, was taking his time, testing each step, worrying, perhaps, that too much haste would cause a commotion, and Julia would look around. Or maybe he was certain that he knew where she was headed, and therefore saw no need to hurry.

Bruce charted an interception course, and worked it perfectly, emerging from the shadows behind the granite fastness of the div school just as Jeremy Flew reached the snow-slick steps up to the lot.

“All right, Mr. Flew. That’s far enough.”

The small man stopped, but looked past him, toward Julia, who was climbing back into the Escalade. “What can I do for you, Mr. Vallely?”

“I think we need to talk.”

“Not just now.”

“Yes, Mr. Flew. Right now.”

The elfin eyes shifted back toward Bruce, seeming to take his measure, then veered off to follow Julia once more. “I’m afraid I have urgent business, Mr. Vallely.”

“Like following Julia Carlyle to see what she’s up to?”

“Urgent business. I apologize.”

Flew moved to go around him. Bruce, much larger, kept his bulk between the little man and the lot. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to insist.”

“I don’t believe you can keep me here, Mr. Vallely.”

“If you’re questioning my authority—”

“Not at all, Mr. Vallely. I quite understand that you have been charged with special duties. Nevertheless, I do not believe you can keep me here.”

“Well, I’m not sure how you mean that, but maybe the easiest thing—”

It was very fast, and very unexpected, and, later, Bruce admitted that he must be getting old. One instant his hand was on the little man’s arm, and the next instant the little man had laid him with surprising gentleness on his back in the snow. Stunned, Bruce took a crucial second to gather his wits, and the crucial second was all Flew needed. By the time the former detective scrambled to his feet, Lemaster’s special assistant was halfway across the parking lot, sprinting for the white sedan Bruce had spotted before. Pulling his gun on the president’s assistant in the middle of the campus was out of the question, and, besides, he had not been to the range in months. Judging the distance and the chances, Bruce headed not for Flew, or for the Escalade, which had just pulled out onto Hudson Street, but for the exit from the lot. You drove up to the gate and the pressure of your wheels pushed a switch that opened it. The process took a couple of seconds, and that would be his second chance to intercept Jeremy Flew.

But when Bruce stood to look back toward the parking lot, the white sedan was still covered in fresh snow, and the strange little man had disappeared.

(II)

F
RUSTRATED
, Bruce reviewed his options. Julia was gone and he had missed Flew. He could call Julia’s cell phone, but what would he tell her? That she was in danger? He had no real reason to think this was true—if Flew had wanted to hurt her, he would have done it long ago—and, besides, if the warning turned out to be false, she would never trust him again. He tried nevertheless, but reached only her voice mail.

He left no message.

Instead, he decided to try to find out why she had left in such a hurry, because understanding her purpose might help him guess her destination.

Only Latisha was still in the suite. Foxon had left hours earlier. The young woman rose to her feet, eyes tinged with fear.

Awkwardly, he apologized for startling her. Then he said, “I need to know where Dean Carlyle went.”

“She went home.”

“Are you sure?”

Latisha pointed at the clock. “It’s almost six. She had a faculty meeting. She hates to stay this late.”

Bruce shook his head. He had seen Julia’s face, and he knew, just knew, that she had been spooked. “What was she doing just before she left?”

“Why do you need to know?” asked the young woman, sensibly.

“I think she might be in trouble.”

“Are you the cause of the trouble?”

“I hope not. I want to help her.”

Latisha took her time thinking it over. Precious moments ticked past but Bruce was not about to rush her. Finally, she said, “You know who her husband is, right?”

“Yes.”

“You know, if you’re lying, he’ll like ruin you.”

“Yes.”

Inside the office, Bruce searched with his eyes, not touching anything, waiting for any aberrant touch to jump out.

All he found was a business card, pinned beneath the keyboard to keep it from blowing off the desk.
A. W. ACME, LAND SURVEYORS
, it read, and below, in Kellen Zant’s zagging hand, “—Secretary?” Bruce picked it up.

“Do you know what this is?” he asked Latisha.

Wide-eyed, she shook her head.

“You’re Dean Carlyle’s secretary.” He pointed to the scrawl. “Is this you?”

“I’m not a secretary.” Proud and frightened at once. “We don’t have those any more. I’m an Administrative Assistant Class 3.”

Bruce was thinking aloud. “You’re right. I’m sorry. There aren’t any secretaries at the university any more. Well, there’s
the
secretary, of course—”

He stopped, the two of them staring at the card.

“Did Dean Carlyle get any calls just before she left?”

“She answers her own phone when she’s here.”

“Okay. Think back. Did the phone ring?”

A slow shake of the head. “It’s been quiet this afternoon.”

“Did anybody come to see her? A student? A professor?”

Another shake. “She had a student, like, two hours ago?”

“Please, Latisha. Help me out here. Anything you can remember.”

“She was looking at that card? Like, doodling on it?”

Bruce looked again. Julia had drawn circles around each individual letter. Several circles. None of it made sense. “And nobody came to see her?”

“Nobody.”

“All right. Do you know her e-mail password?”

The eyes went wide again.

“It’s okay. I’m the director of campus safety.”

“But we’re not supposed to—”

“Latisha, please. Dean Carlyle—Julia—is in trouble. You know that. You’re an intelligent young woman. You must have sensed that something’s going on.” Knowing his size intimidated her, he spoke as gently as he could. “Please. I’m trying to help her. You have to help me help her, and we don’t have a lot of time.”

It took less than a minute.

The last e-mail Julia had opened before rushing out the door had been from Vanessa.

The message read, in its entirety, “its a minus sign.”

Bruce puzzled, then picked up the card and looked again.

Then he had it.

A minus sign. Another of those word games.

The secretary was Trevor Land. Take his surname away from the name, and it became simply A. W. Acme, Surveyors. So?

He said, “Do you know what else she was doing?”

Latisha nibbled her lip, as if afraid to get the boss in trouble. But she had gone this far. She turned to the computer, where Julia had left her Firefox browser open. She clicked a couple of times.

“This is what she was doing.”

Bruce looked. The Internet Anagram Server, the site was called.

Julia had typed in what was left on the card after deleting the word “Land.” Bruce nodded to Latisha, who pressed
PRINT
. The machine coughed out pages and pages of possibilities. He started working his way through them, but it was Latisha, starting at the back of the stack, who let out a little gasp.

She handed him the page, pointing at one line. The words were out of order, but in his mind he switched them around.
VERA WAS MY SOURCE
, it read.

“Who’s Vera?” he said.

“I don’t know.” Then she remembered. “Oh, the fudge!” She ran out to her desk, returned an instant later with a box, mostly empty, explaining her heftiness. “See?” The label.

Bruce looked at his watch.

He called the number, but the shop was closed. He called information, but Vera Brightwood’s number was unpublished, and he lacked official authority. He called Julia’s cell phone, but she must have been in a dead area. He called Hunter’s Heights, but there was no answer.

“I’m about to feel very stupid,” he said.

Latisha raised worried eyebrows.

He called Rick Chrebet.

His partner, just back from vacation, greeted him with: “If it isn’t the pariah!”

But he listened anyway, then told Bruce to hold. Five minutes later, Rick picked up again, but only long enough to tell Bruce to call him back in ten.

Twenty minutes later, now in his car on the way to the Landing, Bruce finally got through to Rick. “I don’t know what’s going on. Units are on the way, and I’m heading out there myself. There’s a report of shots fired at that address.”

Bruce drove faster.

(III)

S
HE FOUND
most of the same cars in Vera’s driveway, and knew she had come at both the wrong time and the right one. The doorbell played the opening notes of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” When Vera opened the door, she just stood there staring and staring.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she said at last.

“Oh, yes, I should.”

“Go away.”

“I want to join the meeting.”

Inside, a seeming infinitude of cats crawled along the hallway and stairs. The meeting was in the living room. The furniture was old and solid. There were sandwiches and soft drinks. Lurleen Maddox, from Luma’s Gifts, sat sternly on a love seat. Danny Weiss, from the bookstore, perched edgily on an armchair. Trevor Land stood beside the fireplace, stolid and unblinking, a New England oak. And seated on a rocking chair by the fire, gazing on the rest as a king on his subjects, was a fortyish white man Julia knew she had seen before but could not immediately place.

“Bit of a surprise, kind of thing,” said Trevor Land.

“I couldn’t keep her out,” said Vera.

“The jig’s up,” cackled Lurleen, who was half mad to begin with.

Julia looked around the cozy room. Nobody invited her to sit. For all she knew, she had interrupted a social gathering. Old friends. She remembered Mitch Huebner, warning her about how outsiders could never know the town’s secrets. And Frank Carrington, who said talking about what happened to Gina could get him into trouble.

The five white faces all looked at each other, waiting for a leader to emerge. At last the stranger with the familiar face said coldly, “You should leave, Mrs. Carlyle. You should forget you were ever here.”

It was the voice that did it. “I remember you. At Hunter’s Heights. The dinner we gave for Senator Whisted. You were there. You’re the one who replaced Astrid.” She pointed at the others. “What is this? A little group to help you cover up what your boss did thirty years ago?”

“You really need to leave now,” the aide said. “For your own good.”

“Not until somebody tells me what’s going on.”

Again the crackling silence spun out. Danny Weiss finally said, “Julia, please. It’s not what you think.”

Lurleen cackled again. “It is too!”

Trevor Land said, “One does feel rather accused without evidence.”

“I’m not accusing,” she said. “I’m trying to understand. I want to know what happened to Gina Joule.”

“So do we,” said Danny Weiss, looking to the others for support.

Julia turned to Vera. “I don’t know about everybody else, but you were helping Kellen, weren’t you? You helped him get information about the Landing. Maybe you liked Gina, because—I don’t know—because she was in your shop the night she died. I think you’re the one he called the Black Lady.” She saw something in Vera’s face. “It was one of his jokes.”