Simple Genius (19 page)

AS SOON AS THEY CLIMBED in Michelle’s truck, Sean rolled down the window and took a deep breath. “I recall you once cleaned out your truck for me so I could breathe without the aid of machinery.”

“That was back when I used to like you,” she said, slipping the truck into gear. “Okay, where to now?”

They drove along the river. Every half-mile or so they passed a ruined mansion or plantation; the only thing left standing in most of them were multiple brick chimney stacks.

“The third little pig was right, build it out of brick and it’ll last,” Michelle commented.

They finally stopped at one property and got out. Sean walked up the overgrown drive and Michelle followed. On the tilting stone entrance column was the name “Farleygate” written in weathered bronze script.

Sean said, “There was a book on local history at Babbage Town that I read through. Farleygate was owned by the son of some famous inventor.”

Michelle asked, “So what happened?”

“Like lots of rich people who inherit money, he blew it. Most of the mansions around here, Brandonfield, Tuckergate, have fallen into ruins.”

Michelle added, “Or been turned into secret labs where people die.”

A chilly wind blew across the front lawn that was rapidly being consumed by the surrounding forest.

“I bet it was beautiful when it was new,” Michelle said as she wrapped her arms around her shoulders and stared up at the manse. Unlike many of the abandoned manors around here, Farleygate’s walls were still standing though the large wooden front double doors had rotted away, most of the windows were broken out and the slate roof was full of holes. “Probably a nice place to grow up,” she said a bit wistfully.

He looked at her in surprise. “You’ve never even owned a home. I didn’t think you were into possessions.”

“I’ve never been married either. It doesn’t mean I can’t look,” she shot back.

Noise filtered out from the mansion.

“That sounds like voices,” Michelle said. She pulled her gun and headed to the house with Sean right behind. Inside, Michelle slid a flashlight out of her backpack and shone it around.

The corridor they were on was long, the floors rotted, the walls coming down in chunks. The air was dank with mold and Sean began to cough. The noises they heard started up again, like hurried whispers. Then a tiny scream seemed to come from right next to them. They both jumped and Michelle swung both her light and pistol in that direction. A blank wall looked back at them and yet they still heard what sounded like buzzing.

She looked at Sean searchingly. “Hornet’s nest?” she said. He looked puzzled and then stepped toward the wall and tapped on it. All noise instantly ceased.

He looked at her and shook his head.
“Human nest.”
His fingers probed around the wall until they found what they were looking for: a small loop of metal. Sean pulled on it and the section of wall opened up.

Something hit him around the legs, and something else around the chest. He fell backward, landing on his butt. Running feet echoed down the hall.

As Sean got up he heard other sounds: screams and laughter.

He looked over his shoulder. The screams were coming from a little boy, about eight years old, that Michelle had a tight hold of. The laughter was coming from Michelle and it was clearly directed at Sean.

After Sean had dusted himself off, Michelle said in a fake stern voice to the boy, “Okay, name, rank and serial number, mister.”

He was looking fearfully at her and Michelle noticed she still had her gun out. “Whoops, sorry.” She holstered her pistol and said, “Come on, talk. What were you doing here?”

Sean said, “You can get hurt in a place like this, son.”

“We come here a lot,” the boy said defiantly. “We never get hurt.”

Sean peered inside the hidden space.
“A secret room.
How’d you find it?”

“My brother, Teddy.
He used to come here when he was my age with his gang. Now it’s my place. All these old places have secret rooms.”

Sean stiffened and looked at Michelle. He pulled out his wallet and handed the boy a ten-dollar bill.
“Thanks, son.”

After the little boy ran off, they walked outside and sat on an old stone bench.

“So we search Babbage Town for a secret room?” Michelle asked.

“Yep.”

“Can I ask why?”

“It’ll give us something to do. And if there is a spy at Babbage Town . . . ?” His voice trailed off.

“You really think a spy will be using a secret room? What, he sneaks out at night on his traitorous rounds? Give me a freaking break.”

“What do you know about Camp Peary?”

“Other than what I told you, not a lot.”

“If you research the place online, there’s nothing. Only the same few articles come up.”

“And you’re surprised?” she said.

“The guy who picked me up when I got off the plane, he said the Navy owned the land during World War II and trained Seabees there. Then they left but came back in the Fifties and kicked everybody out.”

“Everybody?
Everybody who?”

“There used to be two towns over there. Magruder and another one I can’t remember the name of. Apparently the homes and everything are still there.”

“What’s that got to do with our investigation?”

“Nothing.
I’m just killing mental time until I do think of something relevant,” he admitted.

“Speaking of relevant, how well did Rivest know Monk Turing?” she asked.

“According to Rivest not very well.
When we were drinking together though he opened up a bit and said something interesting.”

“What?”

“He mentioned that he and Monk had gone fishing together one day on the York River. They were out in a little boat just drinking beer and throwing lines in the water, not expecting to catch anything.”

“And?”

“And Monk looked over at Camp Peary and said something like, ‘It’s really ironic them being the greatest collector of secrets in the world.’”

“What was really ironic?” Michelle asked.

“According to Rivest, when he asked him about it, Monk just clammed up.”

“I don’t see how that helps us.”

“I never met him but I don’t think Monk Turing would say something without a good reason. Come on.”

“Where to?”

“Remember I said there were only a few articles about Camp Peary on the Internet?”

“Yeah, so?”

“Well two of them were written by a guy named South Freeman who lives in a little town near here called Arch. He runs the local newspaper and he’s also the resident historian for the area. I figure if anyone can fill us in on Camp Peary, he can.”

Michelle slapped her thigh as she rose off the bench.
“South Freeman?
Monk Turing?
Champ Pollion? What the hell is it with this case and freaky names?”

ARCH WAS A TOWN of few streets, a single traffic light, a number of mom-and-pop stores,
a
line of abandoned railroad tracks grafted onto Main Street like ancient sutures and a one-story brick building badly in need of restoring that housed the
Magruder Gazette
. Another small rusted sign stated that the Magruder Historical Society was also housed in the same building.

“If the town’s name is Arch, why isn’t it the
Arch Gazette
?” Michelle asked as she parked the truck and they got out.

“I have my suspicions, but we can ask old South for the answer,” Sean replied mysteriously.

They went inside and were met by a tall black man in his sixties with a lanky body and a cadaverous face outlined with a white-gray beard, in the center of which sat a smoldering cigarette protruding from thin, cracked lips.

He shook hands. “South Freeman,” he said.
“Got your phone call.
So you want to know a little bit about the history of the area?
Came to the right damn place then.”

Sean nodded and South led them to a small room set up as an office. It was lined with gunmetal gray file cabinets and a couple of shabby desks although a shiny new computer rested on one of them. The walls held an assortment of photographs of the area including a large satellite image of what Sean recognized as Camp Peary. A sign above it read, “Hell on Earth.”

Sean pointed to it. “I see you’re a big fan of your country’s premier intelligence service.”

South looked at the photo and shrugged. “Government took my parents’ home and kicked us all out. How am I supposed to feel?”

“That would be the Navy, not the CIA,” Sean corrected.

“Navy, Army, CIA, I prefer to think of it collectively as the Evil Empire.”

“I read your articles on Camp Peary,” he said.

“Well, you didn’t have many to choose from now, did you?” South stubbed out his cigarette and immediately lit another. Michelle waved smoke from her face.

Sean, glancing at Michelle, said, “So you lived in Magruder? I sort of assumed from the name of your paper.”

Freeman nodded. “That’s right. There were two towns on the grounds of what’s now Camp Peary: Bigler’s Mill and Magruder, where I was born. They’re now on the list of places that just disappeared from the Commonwealth of Virginia’s official registry.”

“They keep statistics like that?” Sean asked.

In answer Freeman pointed to a list tacked to a bulletin board. “See for yourself. On there are all the counties, towns and what-not that have either been merged into other places, changed their names or, like Magruder, been stolen by the damn government.”

Sean glanced at the list for a moment and said, “I understand from your articles that the houses are still there, entire neighborhoods in fact?”

“I can’t confirm that, of course, since they don’t exactly let the likes of me wander around there. But from the scraps I’ve gathered from people who have been there, yeah, a lot of the buildings are still there. Including the place where I was born and lived in when I was a little kid. That’s why my paper’s called the
Magruder Gazette.
This is my way of keeping the town alive.”

“Well, I guess everyone had to make sacrifices during World War II,” Sean pointed out.

“I got no problems with sacrifice so long as it’s shared equally.”

“What do you mean?” Sean said.

“Magruder was a working-class African-American
community,
or
colored
community as they referred to them back then. I didn’t see the Navy go sweeping in on any rich white neighborhoods and start throwing people out. It was just the same old, same old. Kick out the poor black folk because nobody’s gonna give a damn.”

Sean said, “I appreciate the problem, South, I really do. But we’re here to talk about Camp Peary and the local history.”

“That’s what you said over the phone, only you didn’t say why.”

“We’re private investigators who were hired by the people who run Babbage Town to look into the death of Monk Turing.”

“Right, fellow they found dead over there. I wrote an article about that.
Hasn’t been published yet because I’m still waiting for the ending.”
He eyed them suspiciously. “So you’re working for Babbage Town? How about a trade? I talk to you about the Farm and you talk to me about what they’re really doing over at genius-ville?”

“Afraid we can’t do that, South. We’re bound by confidentiality.”

“Well maybe I am too.”

“What we’re trying to do is get to the truth about Monk Turing’s death,” Michelle interjected.

“And that other fellow, the one that was killed
at
Babbage Town?
They say he died by accident in his bathtub. I say, right, sure, and Lee Harvey Oswald and James Earl Ray acted all by their lonesome. Well, one hand rubs another. You can’t talk and neither can I. So there’s the door right over there.
So long.”

“And maybe if we find out the truth about Monk Turing,” Michelle continued, “it might not look so good for Camp Peary. And maybe
they
might up and move.”

South’s expression immediately changed. Now he looked far more intrigued than defiant. “You think that’s possible?”

“Anything’s possible. And Monk Turing
was
found dead there.”

“But all the mainstream media’s saying it was suicide. Like those other people found dead around there over the last few years. And all the Internet bloggers are screaming government conspiracy. Wonder who’s right?”

“Maybe we can find out, with your help,” Sean said.

South stubbed out his cigarette, picked up a newspaper lying on his desk and seemed to be reading it. “What do you want to know?”

“What can you tell us about Camp Peary? I’m more interested in current events.”

South shot him a glance over the newspaper.
“Current events?”

“Yeah, like from the air.”

“So you noticed the planes coming in? I guess you do get a nice view of them over at Babbage Town. They’d land right after they passed over the river. Am I right?”

“But at two A.M. you don’t really get a good view of anything, especially when they have their running lights off.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“You’ve seen ’em?” Michelle asked.

“Hey, the damn government doesn’t own all the land around here. Grab me some world-class barbeque from Pierce’s right down the road from Spookville, and head on across the river to a buddy of mine’s place. Sit out on his dock and wait for that plane to drift on in with stuff the government doesn’t want you or me to know about. Let me tell you, I knew something was up before Gulf One and Afghanistan and Iraq started because that damn runway at Peary looked like Chicago’s O’Hare what with all the traffic going in.”

His eyes gleamed. “Once a week I drive my car toward the Camp Peary entrance, see the green metal roofs on the guardhouses, all them damn warning signs saying ‘No Trespassing, U.S. Property’ and I say, ‘Hey, shitheads, that’s my momma’s property, give it back.’ I don’t say it loud enough for them to hear of course,” he added chuckling. “Then I turn around in the little U-turn slot––they have that for people who get lost, or who’re just curious. Turn of last return, they call it, and then I go home.
Makes me feel better.”
South fell silent for a moment. “Those planes come in once a week, on Saturdays.
Always at the same time.
And they’re big jets. I got a buddy at Air Traffic Control and he’s got contacts in the military down at Norfolk. Those planes don’t land anywhere else in this country except at Camp Peary. They don’t go through customs, military checkpoints, nothing.”

“But they’re military planes?” Michelle asked.

“Not according to my friend. He thinks they’re registered as private aircraft.”

“Private aircraft belonging to the CIA?”
Sean said.

“Hell, CIA’s got its own damn fleet. It’s not like they have to tell anybody what they spend
our
tax dollars on.”

“Wonder what kind of cargo is on those planes?” Sean asked.

South shot him a penetrating look. “Maybe the living, breathing kind that only speaks Arabic or Farsi?”

“Foreign detainees?”

“I’ve got no sympathy for terrorists but there is something to be said for due process,” South said firmly. “And if the CIA is deciding who to snatch and bring over here without a court looking over their shoulder? I mean their track record on that sort of thing isn’t exactly golden.” He smiled. “Now if stuff like that
is
going on, there’s a Pulitzer Prize waiting for the journalist who breaks the story.”

“Yeah, it’d be quite a coup for the old
Magruder Gazette,
” Michelle said sarcastically.

Sean said, “They recently lengthened the runway so bigger jets could land and they also got money for a new dorm building. What do you think about that?”

South stood. “Let me show you what I think about that.”

He led them toward another room. Sean lagged behind and when South was out of the room, he slipped back and using his cell phone camera snapped a few pictures of the satellite map of Camp Peary before quickly joining them in the next room. In the center was a large table. On the table a detailed map was spread out.

“This is the portion of Camp Peary that used to be Bigler’s Mill and Magruder.” He pointed at various spots on the map. “You see how many houses there are?
Well-built houses.
You got good streets, access to all points. So you have all this housing and yet you need to build
another
dorm to put up people.
How’s that make
sense?”

“Maybe the houses fell into disrepair or got knocked down?” Michelle said.

“Don’t think so,” South answered. “Like I said, I got folks to talk to me who’d worked there. And if you knock down whole neighborhoods, you got to haul the debris somewhere off-site. I would’ve heard about that.” He pointed to another spot on the map. “And Camp Peary is also home to the only property on the National Historical Register that will never be open to the public: Porto Bello. It was the home of Virginia’s last royal governor, John Murray, the Fourth Earl of Dunmore. Even the CIA can’t touch that without getting in big-time trouble.”

“How’d a place like that end up in Camp Peary?” Michelle asked.

“Dunmore
hightailed
it from Williamsburg where the governor’s mansion was located to Porto Bello, his hunting lodge, when Washington’s army got too close during the Revolutionary War. Then the chickenshit snuck away during the night on a British ship and sailed back to England. There’s a street in Norfolk named after him. Not in his honor, but because it was thought to be the last place he set foot in America, the royal prick. But my point is they got lots of places for people to live, so why the need for a new dorm?”

“You have any contacts at Camp Peary you can work?”

“If I had I would’ve worked them. I just get low-level scuttlebutt from time to time. No one’s gonna be passing me the passenger manifest for those flights if that’s what you mean.” He pointed to some other areas on the map. “They have paramilitary squads training pretty much full-time there. Scary dudes. Practicing snatch-and-grabs, I guess.
Or government-ordered assassinations.
CIA can kill you better than anybody else. They simulate doing missions all over the world. Hell, they even have big balloons they float up to change the weather. Make it rain or snow, stuff like that. Big wind machines too. Or whopper heat makers. Least that’s what I heard.”

“To simulate desert fighting.
Like in Afghanistan,” Michelle commented.

They spent a few more minutes with South Freeman,
then
left after promising that they would keep him in the loop. In return he said he’d let them know if anything interesting came his way. “Who knows,” he said before they left. “Maybe I might get my parents’ house back. Now wouldn’t that be a hoot!”

As they were climbing into Michelle’s truck Sean’s cell phone rang.
“King.”

He sucked in a quick breath as he listened. “Shit!” He clicked off.

“Is somebody else dead?”

“
Yes,
and two dead men are even deader.”

“What are you talking about?”

“That was Sheriff Hayes. The morgue just blew up.”