A Ghost of Justice (23 page)

51

Emily
took the Fleming road exit off Bryan Boulevard, made a pretence of yielding and gunned the Mustang around the curve and up the grade.  She braked lightly, down-shifted and turned sharply onto Lewiston Road.  A minute later and she was on Ed's street.  A glance at the clock told her she had made it in about nine minutes.

She felt herself relax ever so slightly with relief that the Jaguar sat inside the garage, the door to which was still open.  Pulling up behind the Jag on the short double-wide driveway, she set the parking brake and switched off the engine.

While the excess steam pressure released upward with a mild hiss, she sat there, staring at the Jaguar.  The house faced west so even in the fading light she could see what John had been talking about.  It was a beautiful car, but the exact color was elusive.  Only by looking carefully could she see that it had elements of both blue and gray, all dark and glimmering.

Not for the first time, she also wondered at the size of Ed's home.  No children, not even a wife (with the exception of his nine-month marriage seven years ago) to share over twenty-five-hundred square meters, twice what Steve and Kelly had.

She got out when Ed appeared at the inner garage door.

"Hello, Emmie," he said tonelessly.  "What do you want?"

She walked into the garage.  "Can we talk?"

He stood silent for several seconds.  She could see little more than his silhouette in the glow of the kitchen light.  Finally his shoulders relaxed and he motioned her in.

He led her to his den.  "I guess I still have enough regard for you and your father to listen to you."  Ed stood next to the sofa below the shelves.

Emily took the chair by the reading lamp.  She rubbed her thighs.  Realizing she was nervous and probably showing it, she said, "It's cold outside."

Ed nodded.  "You're not here to talk about the weather.  What do you have to say to me?"

"I…I've been thinking."

"About what?"  He slouched impatiently.  "While you're getting your words together, I'm going to fix some coffee.  Would you like some?"

Emily hated coffee, but she was still hungry and her headache was no better.  Maybe a little worse.  "Plenty of cream and sugar."

Normally she would have liked Ed's den.  Looking around, she felt the wood paneling was oppressive rather than warm.  She started to join him in the kitchen, then stopped short.

A small green LED caught her eye.  It indicated his Desktop PDM was in standby mode.  Suddenly curious, she wandered over to see what he was working on.

A touch on the inset pad and the image sprang up.  Just columns of numbers.  Then she noticed it required either expansion to see the whole page, or scrolling side-to-side and up-down.  And it was in the middle of the page.

She scrolled it left.  Each line was headed by office items.  She scrolled it back and touched the EXPAND icon.  The image instantly became a four-foot by two-foot ledger, listing dates across the tops of columns.  The office items were actually subheadings under what seemed to be customers.

Scanning the ledger, she wondered at how a person could keep working well into a Sunday evening on such nothing, at least as she saw it, and was thankful for working with artifacts, actual
things
.  Things people had  made and used, long ago.  Real people.

Just as she was figuring she should put it back in standby, she noted that the last four columns had different headings.  First of them said 'price per,' followed by 'discount' and 'total.'  The very last had no heading at all, and the numbers in the column were two sets per line, one in parentheses.  Some of the last were negatives.

She frowned, not knowing what to make of it.  Then, deciding it was none of her business, she shrank the image back to original size and put it in standby.

"Coffee's ready," Ed called.  "Come fix it the way you want."  His voice was still not particularly friendly.  She was glad he hadn't caught her snooping in his files.

Breathing a shaky sigh, she went into the kitchen.

He motioned at the counter and went to sit at the round oak table.

She dumped an uncertain amount of sugar into her cup, followed by at least an ounce of creamer.  Then she joined him.  Sitting, she tried to think of the best way to broach the subject of her visit.  Nothing coming to mind, she decided maybe the how would come to her if she talked about something else.  "Who are you going to work with at the school system now that Joan's been, ah, is dead?"  Taking a sip, she tried not to frown at the bitter flavor.

Ed took a full swallow, even though it was steaming.  "I don't know yet.  I think I'll wait.  Things are going to be crazy for a while.  But I won't leave them hanging.  I keep good records and, under the terms of the contract, I can anticipate their needs and keep them replenished."

Emily nodded.  Remembering someone her cousin had dated, she said, "Maybe it'll be Paula Altman.  Didn't you date her for a while?"

"Yeah," Ed confirmed.  He shrugged.  "Neal Scott would be better.  Working with Paula would be a bit uncomfortable, you know."

Thinking of Lee, she nodded.  It would be impossible after what she had gone through with him.

"I think she's still mad at me, too," he added.

"What for?"

"I don't know.  I thought I was pretty diplomatic when I dumped her."

"You dumped her?"

"Yeah.  She was too old for me."

"The way you said that makes me think you must've been rather blunt when you did it."  Unsaid, she believed she remembered Paula as being three years younger than Ed.  Maybe she didn't know him as well as she thought.

He shrugged.  Looking at Emily over the rim of his cup, he took another drink.  Then he said, "You didn't come out here just to make idle chat, Emmie."

She gazed down in her coffee as if words would form in the muddy brown.  "You're right," she said.  "I can't think of any other way to do this, Ed.  When did Frank get the Jag back to you that night?"

Ed blinked, then raised an eyebrow.  "What do you mean," he said, giving a heavily serious emphasis to the words.

The expression entering his eyes gave Emily pause, but she pressed forward.  "Come on, Ed.  It's important.  When did Frank bring the Jaguar back the night Steve was killed."

He broke eye contact, glancing about the kitchen.  "I don't know exactly.  It wasn't extremely late."
"How late?"
"Sort of late."  His eyes brushed the ceiling, then at the wall clock.  "Let me think.  It was…a little before ten.  Nine-thirty?  I don't know.  Why?  What's with the time that's so important?"

Emily sighed.  It was just like Ed not to pay attention to a detail outside the world of dollars and business.  She was going to have to confront Frank.  Shrugging with one shoulder, she stirred her coffee.  "I guess nothing," she said.  "It's just that Hardy insists he saw your car in the alley as he ran from Steve's house.  Maybe Frank saw something."

"Hardy again," Ed blurted, not hiding his hostility.  "Didn't I say that guys like him are born liars.  You aren't going to take his word on anything like that, are you?"

She shook her head.  "No.  I guess not," she lied.

"Good."  Ed straightened his shirt, although it wasn't wrinkled.  "Would you like some more--"
His PDM rang, loud enough it made Emily jump.

Ed brought up the com display.  It was in privacy mode and she couldn't see what was on it.  "Shit," he said.  "I gotta take this, Emmie."  Fingering the ACCEPT icon, he drew the audio to his ear and said, "Hello.  Hey, you know this is Sunday?…  What?… Yeah, I understand.  Listen, ah…  Wait a minute."

Touching the MUTE, he said to Emily, "I need something I don't have on here.  There's a notebook in my desk that has some hardcopies in it.  Can you get it for me?  Side drawer.  I'd get it myself but I need to concentrate on this."

She nodded and went back to the den.  She heard Ed resume talking to his caller.  It sounded like a potentially confrontational conversation.  Not likely to put Ed in a good mood for the rest of what Emily wanted to say.

52

John
mused into the empty cup and wondered again if it was poisoned.  An insane notion  considering the way things had developed, he was sure, but his whole existence had been a nightmare for the last several weeks.  Besides, if it had poison then it might be a better way to go than to have his head blown apart; at least it seemed more civilized.

"John," Eric said.

He couldn't help noticing how easily Dr. Sheafer used his first name.  "Yes, sir?"

"Dr. Angelucci came to several conclusions after talking with you.  I imagine that the most important one to you is that she doesn't believe you have what it takes to be a murderer."

John's shoulders sagged forward.  The same rush of relief he had felt with Emily earlier went through him again. 
Someone else now believed him. 
He straightened up, breathing deeply.  Opening his eyes, he saw Eric watching him, expressionless.

Then the archeologist smiled so slightly it almost didn't show.  "I'm tempted to agree with her, John.  I know a few things about killing.  I know some people who have killed.  I don't think you can do it."

He scarcely believed it.  His executioner-of-record was virtually giving him an acquittal.  He put his elbows on the table to hold his head.  The vision of his nightmare ending made his mind spin.

Eric Sheafer said, "Pull yourself together, John.  I need you."

He looked up, wondering what Eric meant.

"If you didn't kill my son, then you are a witness.  There is a chance you may have seen the murderer.  Maybe when they were leaving."

He was getting too close, John thought.  What would Emily want him to do if her father reasoned it all out for himself?  He was likely to if he remembered enough of what John had already said about the car on Edgar Street.

And Eric then said it as if he read John's mind.  "In fact I believe you
did
see the killer.  At least his car."

"Well, ah, I… It kinda took off in a hurry," he said carefully.

"You said it was dark, the car.  Is there anything else you can say about it?  Anything else you can remember?"

The house DM chimed for an incoming call.  John mentally thanked the caller.

Eric accessed it with his PDM, noted the ID of the caller and hastily connected.  An image of his brother sprang up.  Eric said, "Hello."

John could see Bob Sheafer's mouth working, but Eric had it on private mode.

He said, "Yeah, Bob.  Thanks again for supporting me… I, ah, know it's hard for Dad, but… Yeah.  I appreciate it.  He never will understand, you know, that we could've got along if he'd just been a little less hard-headed… Look.  You didn't call for us to argue about Dad and me… God, yeah.  That's what I'm thinking, now.  So.  What are we going to do now?"

Eric sighed and rested his head on one hand, listening.

"That's right," he said.  "I don't anymore.  I wonder if this has ever come up before with this law?"

53

As
she crossed the hall into the den, Emily heard Ed make a rather loud sigh, then, in an exasperated tone, he said to the caller, "Look.  I'll be able to make the payment."

Whatever it was, it was his problem.  He had given her a small job to do for him, and she would do it.

There were three drawers on both sides of the large desk.  First she pulled out the top left.  No notebooks, but a littering of pens and pencils.  There was also a cup that tipped over from the motion of her opening the drawer.  A pile of paperclips spilled out.  Prioritizing her mission, she decided to first find the requested item, then put the old-fashioned clips back in the cup.

She reached over to the other top drawer and opened it.  There were several notebooks in there and the top one had been left open on a page with actual handwriting.  He had said it was a notebook of hardcopies, so she'd better be sure she had the right one.

Pulling it out and setting it aside, she took out the next one.  Opening it, she noticed a printout page of numbers in columns.  Nodding to herself, she straightened up to go back into the kitchen.  Then she noticed more handwriting.  The bottom figure in the right corner was circled with a flourish, followed by an exclamation point.  Next to it was a notation reading: -940k.  It was underlined several times.

Turning slowly toward the door, she thought the circled figure looked familiar.  On a hunch she booted back up the ledger sheet she had seen before.  In a short second she had scrolled to the lower right corner.  She didn't need to double-check it, but she did anyway.  The same figure was there in parentheses. But there was another that was circled.  It read '4541' without a 'k.'  Puzzling, and it made no sense to her.  As she started to return the DM to standby she noticed a ‘k' in the upper left corner.  Not her forte, she concluded and hit the standby icon.

Snapping the notebook closed, she started back to the kitchen but remembered the drawer.  Turning back without looking, Emily banged her leg into the left drawer, still open, and scattered more paperclips out of the cup.

Rubbing her thigh and muttering a soft-spoken, "Damn," she set the book down.  Righting the cup, she started gathering the wayward bits of metal.  First Emily dropped one pinch back in, then a second.  She  had a third readied when she noticed something odd about some of the paperclips.  Some were the wrong color.  Most were coated in soft plastic, but not all.  These were ropey in texture and of a yellow-bronze color.  She jiggled the cup.

The ropey metal twisted.  She reached in and pulled it out.  But it wasn't a clip, and it wasn't just part of the ropey metal.  It was all of it.  She held before her the edelweiss necklace and locket of her Great-granna.

And in an instant it was all clear to her, for, under one white petal, there was a brown stain.  Wide-eyed, she stared at it.

Dear God, she thought. 
John was more right than any of us knew. 
She pushed her hand back through her hair. 
What's Dad going to do?

"Hey, Emmie!  Where's that notebook?" Ed shouted from the kitchen.

"Commin'," she hollered back to forestall any tendency he might have to come in on her.

Her attention thus shifted to Ed himself, the old, almost forgotten burning surged back.  Stronger and harder.  She balled the necklace into her left fist.  Then, snatching up the notebook, she started for the kitchen.  Pausing in the hall, she took a breath to compose herself, hoping to keep the anger and hate in her face to a minimum.

She tossed the book down in front of him.  He glanced up and said, "What took so long?"  But it was a rhetorical question and he didn't wait for a reply, returning instead to his caller.  "Okay, Stuart.  Let me see…"  He flipped through the printouts.  As he continued to talk with 'Stuart,' he switched back and forth from one page of the printouts to files in his DM.

Emily noticed the book's page was the same one in which he had scrawled a circle and a hasty note.  But the DM files he kept turned away from her.

After a few more minutes he finished the call and disconnected.  For a moment he just stood there, looking distracted.  Then he cut a glance her way.

Only a fleeting one, but she saw it all the same.  And it seemed to her to hold a vague suspicion.

Then he smiled, glanced at her again, turning his eyes back to the book.  "Sorry about that, Emmie," he said.  "You know how it…"  He faltered, then picked his statement back up.  "…How it is with sales.  We never really have time off.  Worse than for doctors."  He swung himself back into his chair.

Emily looked at him steadily, cautioning herself to keep the burn out of her expression, but not knowing how well she did so.  She could feel the little eight-millimeter pressing inside her pocket, the edelweiss hard inside her tight fist.

Cocking his head, Ed finally sensed her mood and gave question to it.  "What's going on, Emmie?"

"I think you'd better tell me, cousin."

Emily held her left fist up and at the same time eased her right down to her pocket.  As soon as her fingers touched the pistol's handle, she said, "I think you need to explain what this was doing in your desk with the paperclips."  Opening her fist, the edelweiss dangled from thumb and forefinger.

Ed stared at the necklace, then at Emily.  He pushed back from the table.

Emily brought the gun out, curled her finger around the trigger.  She couldn't miss this close to him.  If only the damned thing was loaded, she thought, suddenly remembering.  But, in Dad's words, Ed didn't need to know
that
.

Ed looked down at the pistol.  He laughed a single, shy laugh.  "What is this?"  Somehow he kept his voice from shaking, though it went up an octave.

"You mean you don't recognize Great-granna's edelweiss?  The one she brought from Austria?  The one she treasured and passed down to Grandmother, who then gave it to Kelly?"

"Of course I do.  Where did you get it?"

"I told you."

"You're lying.  The cops found it, you got it from them, and you're playing a trick on me."  Ed smiled broadly.  "It's not a very funny trick, Emmie.  And in very poor taste, considering the circumstances.  Now you've had your joke on me, so you can stop it."