New Tricks (37 page)

“You’re on a roll,” he says.

“You were sorry when the house blew up,” I say. “Not because Diana Timmerman died, but because you were watching it to see
who went in there. And you weren’t worried, because you had gotten to the lab first.

“And because you were all over that house, that’s how you know it isn’t Jacoby. If it was you would have picked him up already.
You know who was there every minute, which is why it could have been Sykes. But I don’t buy it. Sykes lost the inside track
at four hundred million when Diana Timmerman died. Just because he had access and could have planted the bomb doesn’t mean…”

“Is the story finally over?” he asks.

“Holy shit… ,” I say. “I need to use your phone.”

He doesn’t give me permission and I don’t wait for it. I grab the phone and dial Steven Timmerman’s number. It rings five
times before the machine picks up. I can’t take the chance to leave a message.

I hang up and grab a notepad and paper from Corvallis’s desk. I talk as I write down Steven’s address. “I believe Martha Wyndham
is behind this; she has been from the beginning. Please get some agents to this address; it’s Steven Timmerman’s apartment.
If I’m right, she’s going to try to kill Steven and his dog. Please.”

I start to move toward the door as he stands up. “What about you?” he says.

“I’ll meet you there.”

I
TELL THE CABDRIVER
that I’ll give him a hundred dollars if he can get me to Steven’s apartment in less than ten minutes. Based on his driving
after that, my promise is a highly motivating one.

I didn’t wait to go with Corvallis, because by the time he got downstairs and had a car brought around, it would have taken
much too long. Certainly there is no way he is going to beat this cab.

I could be wrong again, but I should have known it was Martha Wyndham all along. She may well be working for someone else,
but she’s been in the middle of everything from the beginning. And if I’m right, she won’t wait long to go after Steven.

It certainly answers the question of how the person who detonated the bomb knew that Diana Timmerman would be in the house.
Martha was there, just starting to drive away, and she could have dialed the number from her car. And Martha had suggested
I let Waggy live in that house while I decided who to award him to. It would have saved Jimmy Childs the trouble of trying
to kill Waggy.

She was also there the day before the poison was thrown in our yard. We hadn’t been walking Waggy, in an effort to hide his
location. But Martha saw him, and I believe that set the attempted poisoning in motion.

And Martha was one of very few people with access to Walter’s lab, and the knowledge of what he was doing. When she blew up
the lab she must have felt she and her people had learned all there was to learn, of course having no idea that the FBI had
been there first.

As often happens when I get myself in these situations, I don’t have a concrete plan for what I’ll do when I get to Steven’s
house.

I call his number on my cell phone, and I’m surprised when he answers. “Hello,” he says. He doesn’t sound tense or upset,
which is a relief.

“Steven, it’s me, Andy.”

“Andy, how are you? Checking up on Waggy?”

“Steven, have you heard from Martha Wyndham?”

“She’s right here. She came to visit and take Waggy for a walk.”

If there was a worse thing I could have heard him say, I’m hard-pressed to think of it now. I never should have made this
call. “Steven, listen to me very carefully, and don’t say anything. Martha has been behind this all along, and you are in
danger. Now pretend that I asked you over for dinner this weekend, and you’d like to come.”

He hesitates a moment and then says, “Dinner Saturday? Sure, I’d like that.”

“I’m going to be there with the police in just a couple of minutes. When we get off the phone, I want you to very casually
go into the bathroom, and then lock yourself in. Do not come out no matter what.”

My hope is that Martha, realizing the police are on their way, will take Waggy and leave, and not worry about dealing with
Steven. Even if she has a gun, she would be unlikely to use it to shoot open the bathroom door. It would attract too much
attention. I hope.

“Don’t worry about Waggy, just go into the bathroom. Now say something friendly about dinner.”

“Sounds great,” he says. “What time should I be there?”

“I’m going to hang up now. Pretend to wrap up the call and then say good-bye. And Steven, you need to act as if nothing is
wrong.”

I hang up and try to figure out my next step. There is certainly no way for me to storm the apartment, even if I were so inclined.
It’s on the fourth floor, and there’s only a single staircase leading up to it. I would think somebody up there could hold
off a SWAT team, so it’s unlikely that an unarmed, chickenshit lawyer is going to fight his way in. Besides, once Steven is
barricaded in the bathroom, Martha is likely to be making a hasty exit.

I reach the apartment in what must be record time, and I jump out and drop the fistful of money through the window in the
driver’s lap. I go up the five steps to the door, and am confronted with the realization that I have no idea what to do now.

I look around and cannot see any arriving federal agents; for the moment it’s only me. I also have no key to get into the
building, so I decide to buzz every other apartment, and hope somebody lets me in. There are twelve total apartments in the
building, including Steven’s, so I buzz the other eleven. Through the intercom, four people ask who it is, and in each case
I say “UPS.” At least one of them presses their buzzer, and the door opens.

I’m inside, and still without the slightest idea what to do. I leave the door ajar behind me, to make it easy for Corvallis
and his agents to get in should they ever show up. I decide to walk up the stairs and hopefully listen through the door into
Steven’s apartment; at least that way maybe I can find out if Martha’s still there.

I’m on the second-floor landing when a door opens on one of the floors above, and I hear the telltale sound of Waggy’s feet
scratching and trying to get traction on the slippery floor.

I hear Martha say, “Take it easy. Calm down.” She’s got more chance of her command being obeyed if she tells him to fly, or
sing the national anthem.

They reach the stairs and are heading my way. It’s pretty dark in here, which is the only thing working to my advantage. I
back up against the wall, so she won’t see me until they almost reach me. Unfortunately, as I do I hit my head against a fire
extinguisher hanging on the wall. It makes a noise that I’m afraid she has heard.

“Is anybody down there?” Martha calls out, and when there is no answer, I hear them coming down the steps again.

My heart is pounding as they approach, so loud that it seems like it is echoing in the stairwell. Martha has a gun in her
hand as she passes the point at which she should have seen me. But she does not see me, because she is intent on Waggy as
she strains to keep him in check on the leash. He is dragging her forward so fast that she seems in danger of falling down
the steps.

“Waggy! Stop it!” she screams as I jump out from behind her. I hit her from behind, and that, coupled with the forward motion
that crazy Waggy is already generating, sends all three of us tumbling down the steps.

We land in a heap at the bottom, and I am conscious of Waggy yelping in pain. I feel a searing pain in my shoulder, but I
don’t know what has happened to Martha.

“Glad you could join us.” It’s Corvallis’s voice, and when I look up he is holding his gun on Martha. Surrounding him are
three other agents, also with their guns at the ready. It might be slight overkill, because Martha appears to be unconscious.

“Steven,” I say. “Four B.”

Corvallis makes a motion, and two of the agents run up to the fourth floor. I get to my feet and follow them, my shoulder
hurting as badly as anything has ever hurt me.

Steven’s door is open when I get there, and I’m cringing at what I’m going to find. Cringing hurts my shoulder, as does talking,
climbing stairs, and breathing. Thankfully, the cringing proves to be unnecessary, as the agents have gotten Steven to open
the bathroom door and have brought him into the living room.

“Is Waggy okay?” is the first thing Steven asks when he sees me.

That’s my kind of guy.

T
HE DRIVE TO
W
ISCONSIN
is as comfortable as it gets. It feels like Laurie, Tara, and I are a family, and we’re going on a family vacation. It makes
me think that we should get an RV, leave everything behind, and just travel the country, and I mention that to Laurie.

“I don’t think you get good television reception on those things,” Laurie says. “And you’ve got the football season and the
World Series coming up.”

So much for the RV idea.

I separated my shoulder in the fall down the steps, and the doctor said it would take about eight weeks to heal. Fortunately,
it was my left shoulder, because I work the remote control with my right hand.

Waggy walked with a limp for a couple of days after the fall, or more accurately he ran with a limp. He’s fine now, and driving
Steven crazy.

Before we left I shared with Steven what I know about the murders. Once Martha was taken into custody, Corvallis was more
willing to fill in some of my blanks. He hadn’t been aware of her involvement, and even seemed somewhat grateful to me for
exposing her.

I was right that Walter and Robinson were going to sell his discovery to energy interests for a fortune, though I was wrong
that Jacoby had any involvement in the scheme. Corvallis wouldn’t tell me who was going to be the purchaser, but it may well
have been a foreign government. Whoever it was placed a highly skilled agent, who turned out to be Martha, on the inside of
Timmerman’s world so that they could monitor things to their satisfaction. Whether or not Timmerman was aware of who she was,
I don’t know.

Their plan was jolted when Sykes and Diana killed Walter for his money, as they planned to marry after he was dead. Faced
with this situation, Martha copied all of Walter’s work in the lab, and used Jimmy Childs to plant the explosives in the house.
She blew it up, unaware that the FBI had gotten to that lab first and left her with incorrect, worthless information.

She poisoned Robinson so that he could not reveal anything to the FBI, and after that all that was left to erase any trace
of Walter’s work was to have Childs kill Waggy, which of course almost resulted in Laurie’s death.

But that is now behind us, as are New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. We’ll be in Wisconsin soon, and Laurie will do what
she needs to do, and then we’ll all go home together.

We’re leaning toward getting Tara a friend.

A calm, normal friend.

Just for a change of pace.