Shoot (38 page)

“I see. Your theory is that my flag was used by these killers but that’s impossible, Shepherd. It’s been hanging right there for years. Hermetically sealed in nitrogen—which you have let escape. I’m very angry about that, not to mention your mysterious break-in.”

“You don’t look angry at all, Walter.”

“I don’t?”

“No. You look… I don’t know… pleased. You finally get to brag about how you engineered this whole plot. It must have taken years and millions of bucks but the downside was you could never take credit for it.”

“What plot? The murders? Sorry to disappoint, but there is no proof I’m involved.”

“When the police and feds use their expensive machines to compare your flag to the silk used in the shootings, they’ll have a match, not to mention other evidence against you.”

“Firstly, I assume you caused this damage yourself, this evening. You are aware, I hope, that there are several other flags like this in existence, including one or two that have gone missing? Tests of silk wadding, flags, silver musket balls or silver Flowing Hair dollars will prove nothing I have to worry about. Anything else? I’m flying to the Virgin Islands in the morning.”

“You own the Knickerbocker Convention Center. You can deny it all you like, but the proof is there—buried under a mountain of paper and shell corporations.”

“Did you bring a copy of this proof with you?”

“No. A witness. Several, actually. Some of whom were just arrested. We know about your access to the staff, the soundproof rooms, the smoke detectors, everything.”

The crow’s feet wrinkles around his blue eyes crinkled quizzically but his game face didn’t crack.

“I know that’s not possible, Shepherd. It’s late. Please don’t waste my time with bluffing. I know I have done nothing wrong.”

“Not doing anything wrong is sometimes not the same thing as not breaking the law.”

“In terms of logic, yes, you could make that argument. Isn’t that the position of these New Minutemen, that they didn’t commit murder but executed traitors?”

“Yes, that is your thinking, I assume.”

“You also seem to be familiar with that line of thought—the ends justify the means.”

“I am. So are you.”

“So you say. I
was
happy to hear that the police locked up that whole group of right-wing zealots. I wondered if you had a hand in the arrests?”

“I did. Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize, son—you’ve done the country a service.”

“Like you?”

“I was also happy to see those New Minutemen gunmen brought to justice. Terrible way to die but they
were
traitors. You did that also?”

“Me? They threatened a U.S. Navy destroyer and then they attacked it. Didn’t you see that story of mine? It was also on TV.”

“I did, yes,” he laughed. “But it struck me as incredibly foolhardy to warn a warship in advance that you were going to attack and then do so. Suicidal, in fact.”

“That’s the thing with zealots, Walter. They go too far.”

“Sometimes with a little help, eh, Shepherd?”

“I don’t think any of us here, including your cat, will be admitting any crimes this evening.”

“Exactly,” he concluded, with a palms-up, we’re-done gesture. He shot a bored glance at his gold Rolex.

“Your problem, Walter, is you’re a zealot, but you’re a sentimental zealot.”

“I’m a registered Democrat. But I am sentimental about my grandchildren.”

“The zealot part is easy, Walter. You spent the last few years plotting to exploit the rift between Republicans and the Looney Tune Don’t-Tread-On-Me Tea Baggers in a way that would ensure a Democratic victory, shatter their party for a generation and end any chance of a Republican president for decades.”

“Sounds like a good thing to me.”

“I’m sure it does sound like a good thing to you, Walter.”

“My guess is you agree with me.”

“It doesn’t matter what I think.”

“Of course it does, my boy. You might want to join the winning side.”

“No thanks. I was on the winning side for the past decade,” I told him. “The problem was we had to keep winning every day. So, what did it for you, Walter? Gerrymandering? Union-busting? Denying black people and others the vote? Candidates like Miranda Dodge coming too close to the Oval Office and the nuclear button?”

“Those are all terrible things,” Walter agreed. “You know, Wall Street has been very good to me but capitalism is stronger than democracy and has actually defeated it. Greed has infected our country and is metastasizing. Our liberty has been bought and sold. They are currently reversing a generation of civil rights progress and rigging elections in advance to throw the result to someone with fewer votes. I can’t pretend I’m not glad someone took them on. But it has nothing to do with me and it’s past my bedtime.”

It was not quite Walter’s bedtime yet.

“The sentimental part, Walter, is that you allowed me to live,” I told him. “Thank you, by the way.”

“I allowed you to live?”

“Yeah, that’s why you’re so amused by me being here. You like me, admit it.”

“Well, Shepherd, I did—until you burglarized my penthouse and damaged my priceless historical artifact.”

“That’s why you ordered the New Minutemen not to kill me—just to scare the shit out of me, to warn me off. I don’t even think you told them to shoot my dog. That was only because he attacked one of them.”

“You think I gave orders to those gunmen?” he asked, smiling broadly now.

“Sure,” I smiled back. “Not directly, of course. Insulated. I’m sure the blue blood hotel shooters and the New Minutemen all thought they were being funded and directed by right-wing militia central and maybe they were—but it was just little old Liberal you, Walter, and your mountains of money.”

“You know, Shepherd, listening to you spin your conspiracy theory, it occurs to me that you, and those around you, might still be in great danger.”

Neither of us was still smiling.

“You make a good point,” he continued. “If there is big money and other fanatics behind what you’ve uncovered, they might be coming after you very soon—especially if they hear that you have proof against them. You wouldn’t want to lose your parents or your lovely girlfriend Jane. Please be very, very careful. Your opponent may not be the kind of man to make the same mistake twice.”

It had been a while since I had been threatened with death so politely.

“Thanks, Walter. And thanks for making this easier. Did you say you were flying to the Virgin Islands in the morning?”

“Yes, I have a place there.”

“Don’t be so modest, Walter. I read you have your own island.”

“Correct. As the license plates there say, it’s ‘The American Paradise.’ It’s very relaxing.”

“Yes, I’m sure paradise is very relaxing.”

“I’m afraid I should really call the police now,” Walter announced, starting to rise.

I pointed the weapon at him and waved him back down into his seat.

“Are you threatening me, son?”

“Not if you sit down.”

He sat down. I used my phone to send a text and to look up a GPS heading. I plugged it into a program that slaved to two nearby remotes. I had to cancel and override several error warnings before I could re-program the course, heading and altitude.

“Do you understand what I told you, about the danger you face?”

“Yeah, got it, Walter. Thanks, I’m taking care of that right now.”

“On your phone?”

“Sort of.”

“You kids and your gadgets. Meanwhile, the real world passes you by.”

“I’m arranging to end any threat from my opponent first, because I don’t like it when people play God and fuck with my country. Or tread on me or my family. Or my dog,” I told him.

“So you’re risking your life and those of your loved ones, for macho revenge?”

“No. Please understand me, Walter. I had a job, a responsibility. I promised my client, Percy Chesterfield, that I would keep him safe. I failed. My job then changed—find the fucks who did it and take them down. Even the rich fucks too powerful to get caught. It’s not really about rich people, left or right, buying the government. It’s about We The People. Not Me The People.”

“So it’s macho pride.”

“No, professional ethics—and good business. If I let you bump off my customers and get away with it, how will I ever make a living as a private detective in this town? Tonight is about cutting off the head of the snake. That way, nobody else gets bitten.”

“If you’re going to scotch a snake, make sure you have the right snake,” he warned.

“Oh, I have the right snake—you.”

“Shepherd,” Walter said, in a condescending tone, “what have we been talking about all this time? You have no proof, son.”

“First, I don’t always operate on a law enforcement model. I sometimes function in intelligence mode. If it looks like a snake, moves like a snake, hisses like a snake, bites like a snake—it’s a snake. Second, I do have evidence.”

“Other than the flag?”

“Yeah. You talk too much. You said I should be worried about the safety of my loved ones, including Jane. You’ve never met Jane and I never mentioned her. How did you know her name, Walter?”

“I… I’m not sure. Did I use her name? Maybe your parents told me. Yes, of course, that’s it.”

“Bullshit. You also said the cops wouldn’t find anything if they tested the flag, the silver musket balls or the Flowing Hair dollars. I never mentioned silver dollars in print or to you, much less Flowing Hair dollars specifically. How did you know the balls were melted coins, Walter? Oh, snap!”

Walter seemed confused about the colloquial meaning of the word snap but he knew when he had fucked up.

“I never said that!” Walter tried. “Wait! You told me about the first silver coins being melted down—you told me, down in the lobby, remember?”

“No. Actually, I told you the musket balls were silver and were a police holdback—but I never told you that Flowing Hair dollars were melted down to make the musket balls. You just know that, Walter. It was your idea. See, that’s the thing. These Tea Party nuts profess to revere our system but break all the rules. You really believe in America and democracy, Walter. That’s why you used sacred coins, a historic flag and young people whose ancestors were Founding Fathers. These weren’t mass murders or political assassinations to you. This was almost a religious sacrifice, a sacred purgation of evil for a higher cause.”

He stared at me, stunned for a moment—like I had read his mind—before he snapped out of it.

“You can’t prove that! Do you have that alleged statement on a recording device?”

“No. You got me there, old buddy. I can’t prove in court that you spilled the beans—or, the coins. I guess you win again. I should be moving on. Do you still want to know how I arrived atop your skyscraper building this evening?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Okay, Walter, I’ll show you. Out on the patio. But then I really have to go.”

It was still warm outside and a gentle breeze stirred the puffy sea grass clumps near the pool. I directed my host to the flat area near the barbecue, where the two large octo-copter drones sat silent, my twin stealth aircraft. A long, looped twelve-foot line from each was stretched out on the paving stones. I hit a key on my phone and both whirlybirds buzzed into life and lifted off. They stopped and hovered ten feet above us, lines dangling straight down.

“Presto!” I told Walter. “I used magic to get here.”

“You have got to be joking,” Walter said, shaking his head in disbelief. “Drones? You are suicidal.”

“No, I’m not. Actually it was great, really cool. Airborne. I recommend it, Walter. Two thumbs up. Speaking of which, put your hands up, please,” I ordered, pointing the tube gun at him again.

He raised his hands.

“You’re going to rob me?” he sneered.

“In a way,” I said, quickly grabbing the lines, looping them over his wrists and tightening them.

“Hold on, Walter,” I told him, hitting another command on my phone. “Hold on tight!”

Walter, panic in his eyes, clutched the ropes above his wrists, as the black drones buzzed furiously and pulled him ten feet vertically into the night air.

“Wait! What are you doing? You have no proof! You have no proof!”

“Walter, son, you only need proof if you’re going to court. I’m settling out of court. You said you were flying to the Virgin Islands in the morning? I just got you a free ticket to your island tonight on the Red Eye. God Bless America. Have a nice flight!”

Of course the batteries in Sparky’s drones would last less than an hour, so it was impossible for Walter to actually reach paradise. Hey, it’s not about the destination. It’s about the journey. At about thirty miles per hour, Walter would become Icarus and fall from the sky about twenty-five miles out to sea. Unless he got free of the ropes sooner and his weight brought him down in a controlled descent. It was a long shot but he could still come out of this alive if he didn’t panic. It was better odds than he gave Chesterfield and the others.

I hit the last command and Walter rose high into the sky, toward two thousand feet, and began moving on his south-south-easterly course, which would take him over midtown, the East River, and the harbor. As he rose higher, Walter’s cool cracked. I thought I heard yelling. The drones were swallowed by the background of night, leaving a surreal image of a thin man in loud golf pants, flying gently through the sky. In a few seconds I couldn’t hear him anymore. Soon after, his checkered golf pants vanished behind the sparkling skyline.

Presto.

I walked back inside and made sure the cat had enough food and water until the cops arrived. I shut off the tube gun and left it on the coffee table. I found one of my host’s baseball caps in the front closet and let myself out. I took the stairs because I didn’t want to get caught in the elevator or by its video camera. It was a long descent but at least it was downhill. At the lobby, I peeked out. The same doorman from the other night was on duty, nodding off in a chair behind his podium. I waited until I saw his chin drop to his chest and I sneaked out, the cap’s brim low over my face. I silently shut the stairwell door behind me. Walking quietly to the elevator door, to give the illusion I had just emerged from it, I then walked straight out, startling the drowsy doorman.