The Jefferson Allegiance (9 page)

Burns was staring at him strangely. “That doesn’t make sense if he wanted your help.”

“I think he wanted to face whatever it was by himself,” Ducharme said. “Then he wanted to meet me if he survived—or if killed, for me to find him and—”

Burns leaned forward. “And what?”

Ducharme fell back into silence.

“This is my case,” Burns said. “You’re not overseas any more.”

“Right.”

“Things didn’t work out too well for your uncle,” Burns said. He cut another piece off the apple.

“They didn’t for Custer either,” Ducharme said.

“And LaGrange knew that.”

“Yes.”

“Want a piece?” Burns offered a slice on the point of the switchblade.

“No.”

Burns popped it in his mouth and chewed loudly. It was irritating, which was exactly why Burns was doing it.

“Both men were tortured before being killed,” Burns said.

Ducharme looked down at his hands, and realized they had tightened into fists. With great difficulty he unclenched them. “Someone wanted them to talk. General LaGrange wouldn’t have. I don’t know about McBride.”

“You sound sure of LaGrange. I thought everyone talked under torture.”

“I am sure of the General. And everyone talks under enough torture applied long enough,” he corrected. “The killer was in a rush. Also, with torture, even though everyone eventually talks, you can’t believe what they say. It’s a paradox—when the torture is extreme enough to make someone talk, they’ll say anything to stop it, especially what they think the torturer wants to hear, whether it’s true or not. That’s why it’s ineffective.”

“Interesting.” Burns took a moment to digest that. “You often provided LaGrange with backup in Washington DC?”

“Never before. But we served together.”

Burns stared at him. “And now you serve with…?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“The Activity?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Why do you call LaGrange, ‘General’ all the time if he was your uncle?”

“We always called him the General.”

“’We’?”

Ducharme sighed, and felt the pounding in his head worsen. “His son, Charles, my cousin, was also my best friend. He didn’t call General LaGrange, ‘dad,’ he called him ‘the General.’ And it was out of respect.”

“’Was’?”

Ducharme stiffened. “You a fucking echo? Charlie was killed in a car wreck four days ago. That’s why I was at Arlington.”

“I’m sorry.” Burns ran a hand across the stubble on his chin as he made a note in his pad.

“Do you have anything on
his
death?” Ducharme asked.

“I’ll look into it,” Burns said. The FBI agent pulled two wooden disks out of the manila folder and slid then across the table. “Seen these before?”

Ducharme took the disks. One had the number “26” etched in it—the one Kincannon had given him—and the other had “1” on the side. “You know I saw one of them since you took it off me.”

“Tolliver was carrying the other one in McBride’s briefcase,” Burns said. “What are they?”

“Never seen anything like them before. Ask her.”

“I will.” Burns picked the disks up. “They look—feel—old.”

Ducharme pointed at the photo, trying for misdirection. “What’s the monument the body parts are on?”

“The Zero Milestone,” Burns said.

“This placement wasn’t done by chance,” Ducharme said.

“It’s a message,” Burns said with a nod. “I’ve got people working on it.” Burns slammed the blade into the desk top, leaving the knife there, handle quivering. He turned toward the mirror on the side of the room and crooked a finger. “What does ‘See the elephant’ mean in the message?”

“No idea.”

“Bullshit.”

Ducharme didn’t respond.

“So you never met Tolliver before?”

“No.”

“But you were waiting for LaGrange in that restaurant, and she was waiting for McBride. Not coincidence.”

“Brilliant deduction.”

The door to the room opened, and Evie Tolliver was escorted in.

“Professor Tolliver, meet Colonel Ducharme. Again,” Burns said. “Take a seat.”

Evie sat to Ducharme’s right, giving him a curious glance as Burns spread photos over the desk: the head and heart on top of the Monument; a headless body lying in the snow; LaGrange’s heartless body in the driver’s seat along with others of the two crime scenes.

“We’ve got two murders,” Burns said. “Two bodies mutilated. And you two are connected to the victims. I want some answers.”

“What are the questions?” Ducharme asked.

“Don’t push me,” Burns snapped.

Ducharme stared at the FBI man. “OK, what are the fucking questions?”

Burns’s fists clenched. “That asshole thing—nice.”

Ducharme nodded. “It’s a technique.”

“It’s not working.”

“I think it is.” Ducharme shrugged. “It’s called frustration and I don’t know anything more about this than you. Just wanted to share the feeling.” Evie was staring at the gruesome photos, not with shock, but with detachment, which said a lot about the woman. Or anyone for that matter. Tension was coming off her in waves, though. It was costing her a lot to keep her emotions under control.

“Do you see something?” Burns asked her.

“I think there’s a message here,” she said, tapping the photograph of the Zero Milestone.

“’Think’ or know?” Burns prompted.

“Interesting the way you phrased that,” Evie said. “’Think or know?’ What’s the difference?”

“Pretend you have the podium, professor,” Burns said with visible impatience, his fingers lightly drumming on the desk.

“Head and heart,” Evie said.

“We know what they are,” Burns fairly growled.

Evie frowned. “No—the symbolism. It’s from a letter.”

“What letter?” Burns asked.

Evie shook her head. “It makes little sense. But—“ her voice trailed off.

Ducharme spoke up. “Who wrote the letter?”

“Thomas Jefferson.” She reached into a pocket and pulled out a silver cigarette case.

“No smoking,” Burns said.

Evie ignored him and flipped open the lid. She pulled out a piece of gum and popped it in her mouth. “I quit a while ago. Nicotine gum.”

“The letter,” Burns prompted.

“In spring, seventeen eighty-six, while serving as US Ambassador to France, Jefferson met a married woman named Maria Cosway. We don’t know for sure if he had an affair with her, but he certainly was in love. When she left for England with her husband, he sat down and wrote her a rather remarkable letter that has come to be known as the Head-Heart Letter. Where his head argues with his heart over missing her, and whether to pursue the relationship.”

Burns looked confused. “And what does that have to do with the murders?”

“I have no idea,” Evie said, but Ducharme had a sense she was holding something back. “It just popped into my head. And McBride had a fascination with Thomas Jefferson. I’m not fond of coincidence. Except, I don’t know how your General LaGrange,” she added, glancing at Ducharme, “figures into things.”

Burns held out the disks. “What are these?”

“Wooden disks.”

Burns looked from her, to Ducharme and then back at her. “Two wise guys. Are you going to help me or not?”

“We are helping you,” Evie said. “We’re not suspects in this, yet we freely came here.”

Burns tapped the disks. “These come from a Jefferson Cipher.” He glared at Evie. “You know that. Being the curator at Monticello. Where are the other twenty-four?”

“No idea,” Evie said.

“There was something else,” Burns said, grabbing a photo of what at first appeared to be just snow-covered ground. “Something was pushed down into the snow next to the tracks of Professor McBride. A couple of things, actually. As near as we can tell, it looks like the imprint of the bottom of a bottle and some flowers; three of them—roses, as there was a petal left in the snow. Mean anything to either of you?”

Ducharme shook his head and glanced at Evie as she answered: “If it was a bottle of cognac, then I have an idea.”

“Thomas Jefferson put them there, I suppose?” Burns said.

“No.” She looked at Ducharme. “Did General LaGrange graduate from the United States Military Academy?”

Ducharme nodded. “Yes. I did too.”

Evie tapped the photo of the imprints. “Since nineteen forty-nine, on the anniversary of Edgar Allan Poe’s death, a man goes to Poe’s grave in Baltimore and leaves a half-empty bottle of cognac and three roses on the grave. He’s known as the Poe Toaster.”

Burns sighed. “You’re just full of useless information, aren’t you? What the hell does Edgar Allan Poe and a grave in Baltimore have to do with two murders within blocks of the White House, and a two-hundred-year-old letter from Thomas Jefferson?”

“History,” Evie said. “Poe is the perfect connection between the University of Virginia, where McBride got his advanced degree from—and Jefferson founded—and the United States Military Academy, where General LaGrange graduated from—and Jefferson also founded.”

“How is that?” Ducharme asked, intrigued.

Evie leaned back in her seat. “Edgar Allan Poe attended both schools, and he was briefly a confidant of Thomas Jefferson while he was at UVA.”

“I don’t see the connections
now
,” Burns said pointedly.

“I don’t either,” Evie agreed, “but it’s there in the facts. As Sherlock Holmes said: ‘
When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbably, must be the truth.
”

“Now you’re quoting a fictional detective,” Burns said.

Evie leaned back her chair and stared at the FBI agent. “As a detective, did you know that Poe is considered the originator of detective fiction, predating Conan Doyle and his character Holmes?”

“No, and thank you for sharing that worthless piece of trivia,” Burns said.

Evie sighed. “Stop with the condescension, Special Agent Burns. Trivia is insignificant fact until you need that fact. I prefer any truth over the significant lies most tend to wallow in.” She paused. “McBride was meeting General LaGrange at the Zero Milestone for a reason. He was not a man for idle actions or words.”

“Nor was General LaGrange,” Ducharme said. He looked at Burns. “What else do you have from the crime scene?”

“
I’m
interrogating
you
,” Burns snapped.

“You don’t seem to have much at all,” Ducharme noted. “Professor Tolliver just gave you more than you have in your folders.”

Evie spoke up. “What else
don’t
you have from the crime scenes?”

Burns blinked. “What?”

“The killer took the roses and bottle of cognac from McBride,” Evie said. “Was there anything missing from General LaGrange’s murder site?”

Ducharme grabbed the crime scene photos of his uncle’s murder scene. It took only a few seconds to spot it. He slammed a fist down on the desk, the beast surging inside his chest. “The General’s ring is missing. His Academy ring. He always wore it. He was proud of that ring.” He looked at Evie. “West Point was the first school in the country to start the tradition of class rings. We take our rings very seriously.” He turned to Burns. “Who the hell is this killer?”

“We’ll catch her,” Burns said confidently.

“’Her’?” Ducharme folded his arms once more over his chest and stared at the FBI agent. Burns finally stopped tapping his fingers on the table. “We believe the killer was a woman. The tracks in the snow from the perp indicate that.”

“What kind of weapon?” Ducharme asked.

“Blade. Very sharp. One blow to sever the head. The heart was cut out with precision, again with something very sharp, but not a scalpel. A knife or something like it, about two inches in width. It was also used in…” he paused, glancing at Evie, then continued—“the torture. We’ve got a couple of penetration wounds in non-vital areas. Surface cuts in areas where the bleeding wouldn’t be fatal.”

Burns slid a photo across the table. “McBride has defense wounds on one hand.” Burns tapped the picture. “The perp sliced off all his fingers. He must have been holding up his hand to try to stop a blow.”

“Most likely done by the killer out of frustration.” Ducharme looked up from the picture toward Burns. “You know what a bitch being frustrated can be when you’re trying to get information. Was the blade double or single-edged?”

“Single-edged.”

Ducharme nodded toward the switchblade. “You know edged weapons?”

“Yes.”

Ducharme glanced at Evie. She was looking at the photos once more. The conversation wasn’t disturbing her. Not visibly. Strange woman.

“What type of weapon do you think?” Ducharme asked.