3 - Buffalo Mountain: Ike Schwartz Mystery 3 Read online

  “How am I going to explain this to my old man?” Hollis was supposed to be at his house, keeping an eye on his little brother, Dermont.

  “Tell him you busted your leg on your back steps.”

  “We don’t have steps—back or otherwise.”

  “Well, then, how about your driveway?”

  “Won’t work. My brother will rat me out.”

  “Tell him you’ll break his leg if he tells.”

  “He won’t believe me.”

  “Then tell him I will.”

  “That’ll work.”

  ***

  Snow in the valley was a problem off the main roads, in the developments, and out on the farms. Since heavy snow came only rarely, small towns were hard put to justify the expenditure of large sums on plows, salt, and all the logistical problems ice and snow created. The trip from Picketsville across the Covington Road to I-81 had been a challenge. First, it took Ike nearly half an hour to get the old Jeep CJ started. Even with the four-wheel drive, he’d slipped to the shoulder frequently. Jeeps are great for all kinds of adverse weather, but his did not have the weight and, therefore, the traction to overcome ice. He did better than people in sedans and a few of the big rigs. Once on I-81, Ike managed to move along with minimal trouble. One lane on either side of the divided highway had been cleared and he followed an eighteen wheeler most of the way north. Even so, it took him nearly two hours to cover the fifty or so miles to the turnoff outside of Winchester and another twenty minutes to work his way to Weyer’s Cave and the airport. He found Shenandoah Valley Airport and pulled onto its parking lot just as an unmarked helicopter settled on the ramp in a flurry of relocated snow. Ike made his way to the café and had a cappuccino and biscotti in hand when Charlie Garland burst through the door. Without looking at Ike, he led the way across the lobby to the Jack Martin Conference Room. “We have this room reserved,” he said.

  “Good to see you, too, Charlie…No, not much trouble getting here…Just two and a half hours of eyestrain and acid indigestion…So how was your trip?…Glad to hear it.”

  “What?” Charlie’s glasses had fogged up, not the disability it might have been for anyone else, as Charlie rarely cleaned, much less polished, his glasses.

  “I said hello.”

  “Close the door, Ike, we don’t have much time. I have to be back at Langley in two hours. Here, this is for you.” He shoved a leather case across the table at Ike.

  The room could be interchanged for any of a hundred like it across the country. It had a table that looked vaguely like a surfboard on steroids and a dozen black leather swivel chairs arranged around it. A white board adorned one wall and a large aeronautical chart of the valley another. Ike sat and stared at the case. “What is it?”

  “Cell phone.”

  “I already have a cell phone.”

  “Not like this one.”

  “What does this one do that mine can’t?”

  “It’s secure.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know. The guys in tech say it is. There’re complete instructions in the case. The short course is, you call me…I have a new number, by the way, and when I answer, you push this button, and count to four or something, and then talk normally. It’s satellite and so there’s a delay sometimes. The electronics encrypt your transmission and then decode it at my end.”

  “This is like those James Bond movies. You don’t have a Rolex watch with a steel-cutting laser in it for me, too? How is Q, by the way?”

  “Not a joke, Ike. Now, I need to fill you in on what we’ve uncovered so far about Kamarov.”

  Ike opened the case and lifted out the phone. “This thing must weigh five pounds.”

  “Just over one. It’s the electronics and the battery, they tell me. Oh, and don’t hold it up to your ear. Use the hands-free gizmo.”

  “Because?”

  “It’s a little…no, make that a lot, more powerful than the usual thing you get at the phone store. Use it too much and it could fry your brain.”

  “I won’t use it at all.”

  “And don’t leave it in your lap either. Bad for the…you know.”

  “All the more reason not to use it. I won’t even turn it on.”

  “You’ve got to.”

  “Can’t. New town ordinance. I can’t use a cell phone while operating a motor vehicle. Amazing. I never thought I’d be happy about that. Irony, that’s what that is.”

  “Can’t use it while operating a…not even with the hands free?”

  “Well that would put it next to my heart—not good—or in my lap—worse.”

  “Ike, can we move along here? It’s just for emergencies and I hope we won’t need it. But you are conducting an investigation in the field and you are more likely to turn up something needing an urgent response than we are.”

  “You’ll have yours on all the time?”

  “All the time.”

  “But not in your lap. I would hate to think of Baltimore society being deprived of another generation of Garlands.”

  Charlie sighed and leaned forward in his chair and fiddled with an unused glass ashtray. “This is as far as we have gone. It’s delicate, Ike. You know we are in another round of reorganization talks to make the country’s intelligence community cooperate, blah, blah, blah.”

  “Yes, and good luck with that.”

  “Don’t be cynical. You’re probably right, but it’s best to stay hopeful.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Anyway, that means another round of jockeying for position and power. Before the final configuration is set, everybody in all the agencies and the Bureau is anxious to get an edge.”

  “They want to find out your weak spots so they can pull you down.”

  “Yes. And that leads us to Kamarov.” Ike unwrapped his biscotti. The rattle of cellophane drowned out Charlie’s words. “Do you mind, Ike?”

  “Sorry.” Ike slid the biscuit from its wrapper and tentatively dipped it in his coffee. “Go on.”

  “Okay, to Kamarov. He was not eliminated as we believed. He went to some place in Siberia called Novosibirsk and then disappeared from there. It looks like someone over here spent some serious money and committed their Russian assets to get him and squirrel him away. You know black programs?”

  “A black program…funding not logged in on anyone’s budget. Strictly ad hoc and not accountable to Congress, the Administration, or even God. Whose?”

  “We don’t know. We’re guessing FBI, but it could be anybody, Defense Intelligence Agency, White House, or one of the really deep units that we know for a certainty exists only by the footprints they occasionally leave behind.”

  “Kamarov could hardly tell them anything about the old Soviet intelligence that we don’t already know, and it’s all dated anyway.”

  Charlie did not seem to be his usual composed self today and Ike wondered why. Not a good sign. Charlie never seemed to worry about anything. “He came here, I’m guessing, at great expense because they think, or he convinced them, he could tell them secrets about us.”

  “Not us—you, the Agency. I don’t work there anymore, remember? Look, surely whoever is running the black program can find that stuff without him. I know half a dozen senators on the Intelligence Committee that would happily leak it.”

  “What if he had knowledge of 9-11?”

  “He couldn’t know anything about the Agency or 9-11. He’d already taken up residency in the frozen tundra by then.”

  “Suppose they didn’t know that. Let’s say he’s approached by whoever is behind this and let’s say all they want is some information about CIA operational failures in the past. They promise to send him to some place warm. But Alexei wants more—a lot more—so he increases his value by hinting he knows things about 9-11, never says he does or doesn’t, just intimates and…”

  Ike scratched his head and watched as the end of his biscotti detached and sank to the bottom of his cup. “Okay, he bargains his way into their program.
The testimony from a spy of his caliber, whether true or false, would kill you. But what happens when they finally figure out he doesn’t know anything?”

  “They get rid of him and dump him on you—a little joke.”

  “Or, he goes snooping around and actually finds something that is, if not as valuable as 9-11, worth keeping him around for.”

  “Like what?”

  Ike tried soaking the biscotti again. Timing seemed to be everything. “I don’t know. By the way, what are your people doing up at Callend College?” Charlie’s normally ruddy face faded to off-white. “Uh oh, do we have a problem? And here’s another thought. One of your people recognized him. He’s living down near Floyd, for God’s sake. What knucklehead put him there, I wonder? And the suits in DC are told and they order him terminated. End of story.”

  “Or, going back to your first thought, his new employers discover he’s useless and drop him themselves.”

  “It would be easier to just retire him to Miami Beach.” This time the biscotti end fell into Ike’s lap on its transit from cup to lips.

  “…or Rio de Janeiro, Ike. Until we know for sure, we have a serious problem. He’s dead. He’s in your jurisdiction. Why is that? Did someone find out about…Peter? Is someone sending you a message?”

  “Are you absolutely sure the Agency didn’t put him there?”

  Charlie looked down at the table’s surface. “Ike, I honestly don’t know.”

  “They left his driver’s license like they wanted whoever found him to believe he was Harris. Well, maybe not…you don’t think it’s just a coincidence he’s dumped in Picketsville?”

  Charlie only closed his eyes and shook his head. “No, I don’t guess it could be.”

  Ike dropped the remainder of his biscotti into the cup and shoved it aside.

  Chapter 9

  Sam could only stare at Whaite. She’d driven across town in the snow. She nearly hit a minivan with Michigan plates whose owner had decided the middle of Main Street was the safest place to drive. All that effort spent to pick him up assuming that she would be asked to start tracking down Randall Harris on her computer. When they reached the office, she’d planned to access state, federal, and other databases that might have something to offer. Instead, Whaite told her to wait.

  Finally, regaining her voice, she said, “You don’t want me to find Harris on the computer.”

  “Not now, no. Don’t put his name, fingerprints…anything into your queries. Stay away from the feds especially.”

  “This is not making any sense. Where’s Ike?”

  “He had a meeting.”

  “A meeting? In this weather he’s at a meeting? Where?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I’ll call him.”

  “He won’t answer. He can’t use the phone in the car.”

  “I’ll get him on the radio.”

  “He isn’t in a cruiser. He’s driving that Jeep of his.”

  Sam exploded. “I’ve spent the last six months building the information technology capacity of this department so that it is the match of any in the state—no, in the country. We can tap into Richmond, Washington, anywhere. We have software that will let me into places even the President of the United States can’t access and you say, don’t use it? Why am I here?”

  “Wait ’til Ike gets back. Then maybe he’ll tell you why.”

  “This is deep stuff, isn’t it?” Sam swiveled around in her chair and stared through the rime-encrusted window. There wasn’t much to see. The snow had lightened and would probably stop in a few hours. If the temperature rose, tomorrow would be a normal day. If it dropped, there would be trouble—ice. She drummed her fingers and tried not to show her annoyance.

  “So what do you want me to do?”

  “Ike wants you to tap the state’s motor vehicle database and track Harris’ driver’s license number.”

  “We already know that. Why look for him there?”

  “Not by name—by number.”

  “Just the number?”

  “That’s it. See if it really belongs to him. Then, if it does, and remember, stay in the motor vehicle database—don’t go anywhere else—see if he has any violations, outstanding citations, stuff like that.”

  “Suppose, for the sake of argument, I come up blank on the first.”

  “Then run license issues for the month before and after the issue date on his. See what you find.”

  “That’s it?”

  “For now—that’s it.”

  ***

  Andover Crisp was having a bad day. He watched helplessly as Operation Cutthroat went into the toilet. His man had skipped and all the assets he could bring into play had failed to find him. Every hospital in the area had been checked for accident victims, illness, heart attacks, you name it. No DOAs, no John Does, nothing. No one even remotely answering to Kamarov’s description had boarded a plane, train, or rented a car. He did not enter Mexico or Canada. Where was he? Crisp picked up the phone.

  “I want you to do it again.” He waited for the silence at the other end to break. He shuffled his papers.

  “Again? You mean everything?”

  “Everything—hospitals, airlines, cars, all of it.”

  “Okay—”

  “Any hits on his credit cards?”

  “No sir, not yet.”

  “Bank account still intact?”

  “No activity there either.”

  “Keep it open. He’s going to need money eventually. When he does, I don’t want him to think we’re on to him. Let him get the money. With any luck he’ll leave a trail.”

  “Okay. Sir?”

  “What?”

  “Have you considered the possibility that the Agency found out about him and took him out?”

  “I have. Look, they’re not stupid. If they tumbled to him, they’d hold him and try to turn him. He has friends over there, to hear him tell it. He’d probably soak them for more cash and sell us out. No, I don’t think they did anything to him, but if we get close and it looks like they are on to him…well, you know what to do.”

  “Sir?”

  “I shouldn’t have to say it, should I?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Now, go over the ground again and again until we find the gap he slipped through. If he’s out there, he’s on tape somewhere and he’s findable.”

  ***

  Sam stared at her screen for a full minute. Something had to be wrong. “Whaite, can you possibly get Ike on the phone? Maybe he’s not driving or maybe he’ll answer if he sees you on his caller ID. He’s just contrary enough to ignore the ordinance.”

  “You have something?”

  “I don’t know. Look here.” She pointed at the screen in front of her. “Harris’ driver’s license number is listed but without a name. It just says ‘assigned.’ What does that mean?”

  “Beats me. I’m out of my depth here, Sam, but I think you need to back out of that database right now. Can you do that without anybody knowing you were there?”

  “I can try. I don’t know what kind of monitoring program they run up there. What with all the phony driver’s license scams and attempts at identity theft they’ve had lately, they may be running a tracking program and be on to us already. If they trace us, I’ll make sure they know we are a police department. That should satisfy them.”

  “Could you make it some department other than this one?”

  “Who?”

  “Someplace far away, like Kansas.”

  Sam typed furiously for several minutes. She sat back and looked at the screen in front of her. Then she quickly shut the whole bank down. One by one the flat panels flickered and went black.

  “Why’d you shut down? Now nobody can contact us and—”

  “Two reasons. One, I am not doing another blessed thing unless and until you or Ike tells me what this is all about. I know I do not have much experience in the investigations department and I do not know the routines. I have never worked a homicide,
but I know that what we are doing here is not normal and I won’t go any further until I know.”

  “What’s the other reason?”

  “Someone was trying to trace us. I hope I shut down before they confirmed.”

  “Whew. That gadgetry blows my mind. You could tell if someone was trying to find us? So they know it’s us?”

  “Not if I shut down in time. They may not accept the Kansas address, but it’s all they have. They’ll assume it was just another hacker.”

  “You’re sure about that?”

  “We live in hope.”

  ***

  Donnie’s head buzzed a little, but not enough to keep him from seeing what needed to be done. “If your old man is gone for the day, why don’t we just go get that PIN right now?” Hollis, his mind awash in painkillers, did not answer.

  “Hollis,” Donnie shouted, “wake up. Let’s go do the PIN now before your old man gets home.”

  “Donnie, I can’t today, man. I busted my leg, my little brother has probably trashed the house, and all those pills are making me feel weird. Hand me the bottle.”

  “You done took them all. The doc said one every four hours and you’ve took the whole two days’ worth already.”

  “Weird, really weird.”

  “Let’s go. I’ll take you home. Tomorrow we go for the PIN, you got it? Tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love ya tomorrow, you’re only a day away…Tooo…morrow—”

  “It’s stopped snowing.”

  “Whoopee. Get in the truck.”

  Hollis frowned and looked owlishly at him. “Someday you’re going to be in real trouble, Donald.”

  “Maybe, and maybe you’re my ticket outta this burg.”

  “What did you do to the dude?”

  “Do? I didn’t do nothing.”

  “You got his credit cards.”

  “Finders keepers.”

  “I ain’t seen him around lately.”