Blood Flag: A Paul Madriani Novel (30 page)

“What happens if they buy you out?”

“I don’t . . . I don’t want to find out,” he says.

My gaze is fixed on a small glass display case hanging on the far wall. “I see your dad had one of those as well.”

“What’s that?”

“The arm patch. The swastika,” I tell him.

“Oh, yeah. You know about that?”

“Robert Brauer had one just like it hanging on the wall in his home office.”

“I suspect they all did at one time or another,” says Tony. “I’m sure you can’t buy them anymore. Not the originals anyway. They’re probably worth some money, but I wouldn’t sell it. My dad used to smile every time he talked about it. He said he always wanted to be a fly on the wall at the War Department the day they geared up to go visit Hitler and discovered they had an entire US Army division wearing swastikas on their uniforms.”

I laugh. “Your dad had a sense of humor.”

“He didn’t suffer fools. He did a lot of after-hours work in this room,” says Tony. “Mostly research and reading. Sometimes he’d dictate notes. He worked from the table over there.”

I turn. There is an antique oak dining table, rectangular, about eight feet long in the center of the room. Behind it is an old wooden swivel chair. On this side are two simple ladder-back chairs. On top of the table is a lamp, what looks like brass in the form of a human pelvis and a flexible spine so that the user can bend the light to his work. The lamp is on and there are piles of papers and stacks of books strewn across the top of the table, as if Edward Pack might have just stepped out for a moment.

The walls are lined with shelves, stacked with what appear to be medical books and old journals. There is an ancient poster of the periodic table with tattered edges hanging on the back wall. In the far corner there is what appears to be a full human skeleton hanging from a rolling metal frame.

Tony sees me looking at it and says, “That’s Hubert. Dad brought him home from the office when he retired. I don’t know if he’s real or not. I never asked him. I don’t mean Hubert. I mean Dad. But it doesn’t matter either way, the girls have a good time using him out on the front porch on Halloween. It’s a wonder he’s still in one piece. At least I think he is. I haven’t counted his fingers or toes lately.

“On occasion Dad would see patients here, usually old friends or people from the neighborhood. He had a small examining room across the hall. Lillian wants to turn that into a downstairs powder room for guests. I suppose I’ll let her do it.”

“I can see why you’re having a hard time finding the key,” I tell him.

He looks at me, wrinkles an eyebrow, and nods. “You can see the clutter. And this is just one room. You haven’t seen the upstairs yet. It’s a rabbit warren. And then we have the attic, which is full of stuff including old filing cabinets and boxes, and then there’s the basement. Are you sure you guys can’t stick around a few more days to help me look?” he says. “There’s a million places Pop could have hidden it, assuming he didn’t throw it out.”

“I’d love to, but we can’t. I have to get back to the office,” I tell him. “I’ve got a hearing Monday morning. We can stay the one night and that’s it.”

“I understand,” he says. “Let’s sit down for a minute. We need to talk.”

We take the two ladder-back chairs facing each other. I want to lean my elbow on the wood of the table but I can’t. It’s covered with papers and books right to edge, some of it printed items from sites on the Internet.

“I wanted to fill you in on what I found out from the local police,” says Tony. “There is something new.”

My eyes scan the decoupage of printed material as we talk. I’m interested in what the old man was into. It’s an eclectic lot. “What did you find out?” I ask.

There is a pile of history books on the war, a few by Stephen Ambrose and several others. All of them seem to be on the European Theater of the war. Some of them I’ve read. Others I haven’t.

“In terms of my dad, as I said, nothing’s changed,” says Tony. “No movement.”

There’s a printed article on tropical diseases. I can see only the top layer of paper. And a large blue picture, what looks like a photographic print from an electron microscope, a vastly magnified spiraling helix, under it the words “Evidence Ends the 126-Year-Old Mystery.” I can’t see the rest of it.

“The cops are still insisting that he died of natural causes,” says Tony.

There’s a treatise on hemophilia, an article on fabrics, silks, and the ancient art of Eastern dyes.

“Is there something on the table that interests you?” he says.

“Oh, no. I’m sorry. I take it this is all stuff that was left over from your dad?”

“Yeah. You can tell I’m not very good at organization. I go through his papers and I can’t decide what to throw out and what to keep. And if I decide to keep it, why, and how to file it. Lill says I suffer from decision disorder. She’s probably right. In fact, I know she is.”

“Go on,” I tell him. “You said there was something new?”

“It regards Walter Jones,” he says. “There’s a woman I know who works at the police department. I can’t give you her name because she could get in serious trouble. But she told me that the investigation into Jones’s death has opened up. Remember I told you that they had a lead as to the hit-and-run driver they suspect may have run Jones down?”

“Yes, I remember.”

“It’s more than that,” says Tony. “According to this woman the cops found a witness who says the driver was hired. He was paid. It was a contract killing to get rid of Jones. She said the cops were still looking for a motive. They didn’t know why.”

“If they read the newspapers or watch the news they know now,” I tell.

“Exactly,” says Tony. “According to the woman I talked to, the witness who talked to the police identified the driver. The man has a long rap sheet. He’s done time in prison. If the police can find him, and the woman tells me they think they can, there’s a good chance they can get him to talk. She said something about trading up.”

“They’ll want the man who hired him,” I tell him. “They’ll offer the driver a deal in return for his testimony.”

“That’s what I thought. If so, whoever hired him killed my father, Robert Brauer, and probably the girl mentioned in the story.”

“Sofia,” I say.

FORTY-ONE

J
oselyn has that mark of every intelligent person, a highly tuned and adept talent for listening. In this case it is fortunate, not only for Joselyn and me, but for Tony. During her time in the kitchen with Lillian, Joselyn picked up on the fact that the woman was in the dark regarding Tony, his father, the Blood Flag and what was going on, and the fact that Tony was leading her astray. Joselyn didn’t say anything to Lillian, but she listened.

On the flight back from Oklahoma City we compare notes and I explain to her what had happened.

“I hope you didn’t encourage him in this deception,” she tells me.

“I didn’t.”

“Good,” she says.

“But I told him I understood.”

She looks at me and I know instantly that I’m in trouble. “If you ever do that to me,” she says, “I will leave you, but not until I kill you first. Tony made his wife look like a fool. I trust you can understand that?”

“He was trying to protect her.”

Joselyn turns in her chair and amps up her cold stare. “Do you understand?”

“I understand what you’re saying.”

“Good. Because men who believe that grown women should be deceived from time to time, even for their own benefit, are only deceiving themselves,” she says. “Women are adults, not children. If you can’t trust them with the truth, then you shouldn’t marry them, or live with them for that matter.”

If her tongue were a rapier, its sharp, pointed tip would be coming out of my back about now.

“It’s not our place to interfere in their marriage,” I tell her.

“Of course not. That’s the reason I didn’t say anything,” she says. “I’m telling you.”

“Point taken.”

“Good.” She waits a few moments for the roar of the jet engines to melt the ice, and then says, “What did you guys talk about?”

I tell her about the hit-and-run driver and Walter Jones, the fact that the police believe it was a killing for hire and that they may be closing in on the man behind the wheel. I also tell her about the things I saw on Edward Pack’s desk, the books and the papers on tropical diseases, diseases of the blood, and the photograph of the blue helix, something about solving a 126-year-old mystery, and the swastika on the wall.

“But I take it he hasn’t found the key,” says Joselyn.

“No, not yet. But he’s still looking.”

“This man, Jones, if they find whoever hired the driver, do you think that person murdered Sofia?”

“It’s possible. We’ll know if and when they catch him.”

“How?”

“The DNA under her fingernails. Whoever it was left his calling card.” I begin to wonder if Ricardo Menard has ever been to Oklahoma City.

When we get off the plane I turn on my cell phone and there’s a message from Herman. Sunday afternoon, the office is closed. I wonder what he wants. He says I should call him. It doesn’t matter what time. So I do.

His cell rings a couple of times and then he answers.

“You’re back in town?” says Herman.

“We just got in. I got your message. What’s going on?”

“It’s that car,” says Herman. “Remember? The rusted-out heap the neighbors saw out in front of Brauer’s house?”

“What about it?”

“We think we found it. At least we found the license number. It’s California 5QPU783,” says Herman.

“Who does it belong to?”

“We don’t know.”

“If you’ve got the plate number . . .”

“We can’t find a registered owner,” says Herman.

“Then it must be stolen.”

“Possibly,” says Herman. Then he explains. One of his people found a record of a stop by the police out in the east county, in a small town. According to the police department computer the plates were on a 1977 Chevy Chevelle.

“Apparently the rear plate had a current-year tag, because the box on the ticket form was checked,” says Herman.

“If there was a current tag, then it has to be registered to somebody,” I say.

“You would think so,” he says. “But it’s not. We checked. The cop pulled the car over for a broken taillight. According to the single note on the ticket, the vehicle appeared to be in bad shape. The cop was getting ready to write a ‘fix-it’ ticket, but then for some reason he stopped.”

“Why?”

“We don’t know,” says Herman. “All we know is that the cop crossed out the ticket and canceled it in his book. The information from the canceled citation showed up in their computer because the ticket forms are numbered in series. They have to account for each one, to make sure the cops don’t go into business for themselves, taking cash on the roadside and tearing up tickets. There’s a box, a field in the computer for a written explanation, but this one was blank. We’re checking to see if we can get more information. We have the officer’s name.”

“It could be he got an emergency call,” I tell him.

“I thought about it. That’s possible.”

“And he forgot to enter it in the computer. Or the driver talked his way out of it.”

“I doubt that,” says Herman.

“Why?”

“Remember what the neighbor said? The driver had gang graffiti tattooed on his neck and face and a piercing in his lip.”

“Maybe it’s a different car?”

“No. It’s the right car,” says Herman. “When my guy looked at the color of the vehicle in the computer, all it said was ‘Rust.’ ”

FORTY-TWO

F
our days after arriving home from Oklahoma City, I open my e-mail on the computer in the office and among the messages is one from Tony Pack. The subject line reads: “Eureka—I found it!”

I open the message.

Paul:

Early this morning rummaging through a file cabinet in the attic I found the safe-deposit key. It’s the one sent to my father by the lawyer, Mr. Fish. The key was still in the same box that I picked up that day at the post office. I recognized it. The box looked the same as the one you showed me in your office. To me the key looks a little different than the one you had. It is straight-sided, no grooves, brass the same as yours. The part you grip with your finger to turn the key, I think it’s called the bow, is square, not round like yours. Perhaps that’s why it looks different to me. I can’t be sure and we won’t know for certain until we compare them. As I told you, the wrapper and whatever papers were inside the box were burned by my dad in his office the day the box arrived. And there’s one more thing. In the same cabinet drawer where I found the box, I found a file. It was labeled “B.F. Instructions.” Inside was a small plastic sandwich bag containing a computer thumb drive. I tried to open it in my PC but I couldn’t. It looks like whatever is on the drive may be encrypted. I didn’t want to mess with it and take a chance on losing whatever is written on it so I took it out and put it back in the bag. I’m sorry we need to meet again but it’s the only way I can think to do this. I know you’re probably tired. I’m exhausted. I’ve been up all night.

I look at the time on his e-mail. It arrived in the middle of the night, 1:10
A
.
M
. my time, 3:10 in the morning, Oklahoma City time.

“Maybe we can find someplace in between here and there to meet so that we can do it quickly. Call me when you have time.”

I grab my cell phone and check the numbers, his office at the bank or the house. I’m thinking that if he was up all night there’s a good chance he’s home. I call. Lillian answers the phone.

“Lillian, it’s Paul Madriani.”

“How are you?”

“Good, thanks. Is Tony there?”

“He is, but he’s sleeping.”

“I thought as much. I got an e-mail from him this morning. He and I need to talk.”

“Is it important?”

“It might be.”

“I hate to wake him,” she says. “He’s only been down about two hours. He’s been up all night going through his dad’s stuff. Sometimes he gets so wound up.”

“Listen, that’s fine. Let him sleep. When he wakes up, could you please ask him to call me?”