First Family (35 page)

W
E’D EXHAUSTED
just about everything we could think of,” said Phil Jenkins, Sean’s professor friend at Georgetown University. “Of course it wasn’t the Chinese Yi as you initially suspected. Wrong alphabet. But college professors love a challenge like this, so I called in other faculty from some of our interdisciplinary studies. At least it beat grading fifty exams.”

“I bet,” said Michelle as she perched on the edge of Jenkins’s desk in his cluttered office. She would have opted for a chair but the two in the room were piled with five-pound books.

“And you found what?” asked Sean impatiently.

“Ever heard of Muskogean?”

“Isn’t that a town in Wisconsin, or maybe Oklahoma?”

“That’s Muskogee. No, it’s Indian. Native American Indian. Without getting too technical, it’s a family of languages, actually.”

“So the markings we gave you are Muskogean?” asked Michelle.

“The language is actually Koasati, or more typically known as Coushatta. But it is of Muskogean origin.”

“So what does it say?” asked Sean. “What we gave you.”

Jenkins looked down at a sheet of paper with scribbles all over it. “It was a bit difficult to figure out because none of the accent marks or other pronunciation points were included. For instance, there should have been a colon between
Chaffa
and
kan
. And, of course, the letters weren’t separated into words. That made it far more difficult.”

“Sounds like they didn’t want to make our job easy,” commented Sean.

“And they didn’t,” remarked Jenkins. “So what it says, as best we can figure, is this.
Chaffakan
means one.
Hatka
means white and
Tayyi
means woman.”

“One white woman?” said Sean.

“One
dead
white woman,” amended Michelle.

Jenkins glanced up sharply at her. “Dead?”

“It’s a long story, Phil,” said Sean. “What can you tell us about this Koasati stuff?”

“I consulted with a professor here who specializes in Native American languages. He’s the one who really cracked this. The Koasati tribe was part of the Creek Confederacy in what is now Alabama. However, when the Europeans started immigrating there, and because they were also under attack from rival tribes, the Koasati and the Alibamu tribes moved to Louisiana and then on to Texas. There are apparently no members of the tribes still living in Alabama. The bulk of the people who still use the language, and they only number in the hundreds, reside in Allen Parish, which is a little north of Elton, Louisiana. Although there are apparently a few speakers living in Livingston, Texas.”

Michelle and Sean stared at each other.

She said, “Texas and Louisiana. Pretty big places to search.”

“But if it’s narrowed down to towns, and to a few hundred people?” said Sean.

“But why put the words on Pam’s arms to begin with? Sure, they made it hard, but not impossible,” she commented.

Jenkins broke in. “These words were on a woman’s arms? And you said something about dead?”

“Not just dead,
murdered
,” said Michelle.

“Oh dear Lord,” said Jenkins and he dropped the page on his desk.

“It’s okay, Phil, I doubt these folks are going to come back for another language demonstration. Thanks for the assist.”

As they walked from his office, Sean was shaking his head. “Why does this seem like a diversionary tactic?”

“And a knuckleheaded one at that, because they didn’t have to do it at all.”

“Agreed.”

“So what now?”

“We need to talk to Waters. Tell him what we know.”

“That jerk? Why?”

“Because we promised. And we need to find Willa just as fast as we can. So we’re going to need the Feds’ muscle behind us.”

“Yeah, well, don’t be surprised if that muscle comes down on us instead.”

S
EAN CALLED
W
ATERS
and they arranged to meet at a bar a few blocks away from the FBI’s Hoover Building.

“Didn’t expect to get a call from you,” Waters said as they sat at a table in the back.

“I told you if we had anything to report we’d be in touch.”

“So report.”

“The markings on Pam Dutton’s arms are a Native American language known as Koasati.”

Waters sat up straighter. “Do you know what it says?”

“ ‘One white woman,’ ” answered Michelle. “Something we obviously already knew.”

“That makes no sense,” said Waters.

“It was probably a clumsy attempt at a red herring because they’d messed up.”

“Messed up how?”

Sean said, “Guy panicked, killed the lady when he didn’t want to, and painted her arms to throw us off. I don’t think anybody was supposed to die that night. Tuck would’ve been the most obvious threat and even then they just knocked him out when they could’ve easily just pumped a round into him.”

“Okay, so tell me about this Koasati stuff.”

Sean relayed what they’d learned from Phil Jenkins about the Indian tribe.

“Well, maybe that narrows it down some,” Waters said doubtfully. “But some Indian tribe having a beef with the president to such an extent they grab his niece? Pretty far-fetched.”

“Second point,” said Sean. “Pam Dutton only gave birth to two kids. We think Willa’s adopted.”

“That one I know. ME gave us the heads-up after you two brought it to her attention.”

“We’ve talked to Tuck and he won’t say a word about it. Just says we’re nuts. The First Lady claims ignorance. Says the Duttons were living in Italy when Willa was born. Or supposedly born.”

“Maybe Willa’s not the adopted one,” said Waters.

“The other two look a lot like their parents,” Michelle pointed out.

“But the ME said only two, so, regardless of which kid it is, Tuck is lying,” said Sean. “You may have to lean on him to get to the truth.”

“Leaning on the president’s brother-in-law isn’t that easy,” noted Waters nervously.

“There must be some records somewhere that would definitively state that Willa is adopted. Either here or in Italy. The FBI can surely find that out.”

“You think if she was adopted it had something to do with her kidnapping?”

“How could it not?”

“But back up a minute,” said Michelle. “So what if Willa is adopted? Why would Tuck not want to admit that? It’s not like adoption is illegal.”

“It might make a difference if the mother’s identity is an issue somehow,” said Sean slowly.

“Or maybe the
father’s
,” pointed out Michelle.

The three stewed on that for a few silent moments.

Waters finally spoke up. “And the First Lady didn’t know anything about this? Her own brother?”

“So she claims,” answered Sean.

Waters gave him a sharp glance. “But you don’t believe her?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“So you
do
believe her?”

“I didn’t say that either.” Sean sat back and stared at the FBI agent. “So anything on your end?”

Water’s face went slack. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know this was a two-way conversation.”

“If we work together the odds of getting Willa Dutton back alive might go up a little bit.”

Waters still didn’t seem convinced.

“Look, I told you, I don’t care who gets the credit or the glory. We just want the girl back.”

“You can’t possibly have a problem with that deal,” said Michelle.

Waters finished his beer and eyed her curiously. “Was your mother really murdered?”

“Yes.”

“Any leads?”

“The chief suspect is my dad.”

“Jesus!”

“No, his name’s Frank.”

“Shouldn’t you be focused on that?”

“I’m a woman.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning, unlike men, I can handle more than one thing at a time.”

Sean tapped his arm. “So what’s it gonna be, Chuck?”

Waters motioned to the waiter for another round, then said, “We found a hair on Pam Dutton that didn’t belong to her or anyone else in her family.”

“I thought the trace DNA didn’t produce a criminal database hit,” said Michelle.

“It didn’t. So we ran a different test on the hair. An isotopic exam looking for geographic clues.”

Sean and Michelle exchanged glances.

“What’d you find?” asked Sean.

“That the person whose hair it was has eaten a diet high in animal fats for years but also one with plenty of vegetables.”

“What can you deduce from that?” asked Michelle.

“Not a lot, although the typical American diet doesn’t include a lot of veggies anymore.”

“Were the fats or vegetables processed?” asked Michelle.

“Don’t think so, no. But the sodium levels were high too.”

Sean looked at Waters. “Maybe a farm? They slaughter and eat their own meat? Cure it with salt, maybe. Harvest crops. Preserve and can them, again with salt.”

“Maybe,” said Waters. “They also found something else in the exam.” He hesitated.

“Don’t keep us in suspense,” joked Sean.

“The water the person drank. That’s reflected in the hair isotope too. The lab narrowed it down to a three-state area.”

“Which three?”

“Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi.”

“That dovetails with the mail triangulation,” noted Michelle.

“Three across,” said Sean softly, staring at his drink. “Three states right in a row.”

“Apparently both the rain and drinking water down there has some pretty distinctive markers,” said Waters. “And it’s been mapped pretty comprehensively over the years. That’s why the lab feels very confident about the findings.”

“Could they tell if it was well or city water?”

“Well,” said Waters. “No commercial chlorine or other purifiers like that.”

“So that means rural?”

“Possibly, although there’re certainly some subdivisions on well water down there. I used to live in one of them before I got assigned here.”

“And with diets high in unprocessed animal fat and veggies?” exclaimed Sean.

“Okay, quite possibly rural. But with all that, it’s still a big area to focus on.”

“But those states don’t square with the Koasati piece,” said Michelle. “Texas or Louisiana.”

“But the Koasati
are
from Alabama originally,” pointed out Sean.

“Originally, yeah, but not now.”

“Can you still run down the Koasati angle?” he asked Waters.

Waters nodded. “I’ll have agents down there get started immediately on it.” He studied them both. “So is that all you know?”

Sean finished his drink and rose. “It’s all we know that’s worth sharing.”

They left Waters to his second beer and walked back to the SUV. Along the way Michelle’s phone buzzed. She looked at the screen.

“Who is it?” asked Sean.

“My caller ID says a Tammy Fitzgerald.”

“Who’s she?”

“Somebody I don’t know.”

She put the phone away and said, “You didn’t mention the letter the First Lady received to our little FBI chum.”

“That’s right, I didn’t.”

“But why not?”

“Because I’m willing to let her come to her senses before I throw her to the Feds on an obstruction charge. That’ll probably screw the election for the president too. And he’s done a good job.”

“Are you kidding me? Who the hell cares what it does politically to the First Couple? What if it costs Willa her life? Isn’t that what you care about, getting Willa back? Or was that a load of shit you were shoveling Waters back there?”

Sean stopped walking and turned on her. “Michelle, I’m doing the best I can here, okay? It’s complicated. It’s damn complicated.”

“It’s only complicated if you make it so. I like to keep things simple. Find Willa, any way I can.”

He was about to say something when he stopped and stared over her shoulder.

Michelle finally turned to see what he was looking at.

There were two men across the street dressed in Army cammies walking along.

“Damn.”

Michelle turned back to look at Sean. “Damn what?”

“You said you thought the guy you saw with the MP5 was wearing military-level body armor?”

“That’s right.”

“Yeah, that’s right,” said Sean.