Baltimore Blues

by Laura Lippman

  “Did you have a nice visit?” he asked Tess and Fauquier.

  “We sure did,” Fauquier said, beaming. “She’s pretty, don’t you think, Mr. Lardner? I’d sure like to take her out on a date.”

  The official nodded as if this seemed reasonable.

  “I’m not exactly your type,” Tess said. “And not just because I’m a woman. You see, Mr. Fauquier, I don’t think you could be attracted to anyone you couldn’t kill or hurt. And unlike your little boys, I could definitely kick your ass. You are one twisted fucker.”

  Fauquier glowered. Garfield Lardner stood openmouthed, shocked that the granddaughter of Ed Monahan, the seafood king, would be so crude.

  Chapter 27

  Home again, Tess tried to think like a newspaper editor, like Jonathan’s boss. She sat in front of her computer and transformed herself into someone pedantic and nit-picking, someone who could lecture for hours on “infer” and “imply,” unaware a five-alarm fire burned across the street.

  What hoops would an editor have asked Jonathan to jump through in order to get his story in the paper? First of all he would have had to figure out, without Fauquier, which was the wrong confession. There could be any number of ways to do that. Interviews with homicide detectives from the time. Examining the police reports and court papers.

  But that wouldn’t be enough. With Abramowitz dead and Fauquier condemned to die, about as disreputable as a source could be, Jonathan needed to find the money, where it came from, and where it went. Like a bird building its nest, he would have ferreted out every available material. Twig, string, paper. Mainly paper.

  Follow the money, Deep Throat had whispered in a Washington parking garage. Or had he? It didn’t matter. Journalists of Jonathan’s generation and ambition had been intoning those instructions ever since, their professional mantra. Follow the money. Michael Abramowitz had left an estate of almost one million dollars. That was one place to start. But a shortcut through Jonathan’s brain would be nice. His brain being unavailable, Tess would have to settle for the next best thing.

  Tess reached for the phone and called Whitney at her office.

  “Have they cleaned out Jonathan’s desk yet?”

  “Not yet, but I’m sure they will soon. They don’t have enough desks around here for prolonged periods of mourning. And Jonathan’s desk was by a window, so a lot of people want it.”

  “What about his computer files? Are they still in the system?”

  “Hmmmm—actually, the head computer geek is at some conference learning how to make the system even more complicated and cumbersome to use, so he hasn’t been here to reclaim all that storage space for his precious mainframe. But you couldn’t get in without Jonathan’s password, and only the geek would know that.”

  “I’d never get permission to go into the Blight’s computer, anyway. Even if Tyner went to court, the paper would have to claim it’s privileged, on principle. And if the judge decided in Rock’s favor, the computer geek would ‘accidentally’ kill everything.”

  Whitney laughed. “You have it all figured out, don’t you? I bet you even have an alternative plan.”

  “I will, after you explain the Blight’s computer system to me. But Whitney—I want to do this tonight.”

  Several hours later Tess and Whitney set out from Fells Point in Whitney’s Jeep Cherokee. Like Crow, Whitney seemed to find this a great adventure, but she was better dressed, in black leggings and an open-weave black sweater over a white T-shirt. She had accessorized with clunky black boots with white socks, and gold earrings set with onyx and seed pearls.

  “No white gloves?” Tess asked facetiously, only to have Whitney thrust a pair at her, probably left over from dancing school.

  “I can afford to leave fingerprints in the building. You can’t, my dear.”

  “White gloves with blue jeans after September first? OK, but I think this is a major fashion faux pas.”

  Technically an all-day newspaper, the Beacon-Light liked to boast it had reporters on duty twenty-four hours. From midnight until 4 A.M., however, the staff consisted of a solitary police reporter. Young and scared, he sat by a scanner, petrified he might have to leave the building. He seldom did, but Tess and Whitney could avoid him altogether just by using the back stairs. The electronic traps were a little harder to elude.

  First they had to get in the building without leaving any trace. Whitney had a key card, which unlocked the doors along the way, but she didn’t want the security system to have a record of her entering at 1 A.M., a record that could come back to haunt her if someone discovered the computer had been breached. Whitney had solved that problem easily. After Tess’s call she had waited until the editorial writer in the cubicle next to hers had gone to the men’s room, then she’d slipped his card out of his jacket pocket and left hers in its place.

  “I’ll swap back tomorrow,” she told Tess, sliding the card through the lock at the building’s side entrance. “Ted will never notice he spent twenty-four hours being 1375 instead of 926. And, if someone ever asks him what he was doing here in the middle of the night, he should be very convincing in his protestations of innocence.”

  After taking the back stairs to the fourth floor, Whitney led Tess to the editorial department’s writing room. The editorial writers had their own cubicles, but they were forced to use a communal room when it was time to put their punditry on the computer screen.

  “They thought we needed to develop camaraderie,” Whitney said. “Instead all the editorial writers have developed crushes on different computers, claiming there are significant differences. They pitch fits if they can’t get their favorites.”

  Whitney signed on. “I’m not using my real handle, but the all-purpose one they give the interns,” she explained. “OK, look—reporters create stories in all-access baskets, but they can store them in confidential baskets only the system manager can access. Jonathan was more paranoid than most and always used his private basket. But there’s a chance he ran out of storage space and had to depend on one of the obscure all-access baskets for backup. There are hundreds of baskets hidden in the computer no one knows about.”

  She typed in “Ross,” instructing the computer to pull up any file created by that user. It gave her only two, which Whitney quickly scanned.

  “A FOIA request from last winter to the chronically corrupt housing department. Nothing odd there—we file one of those every week. And a copy of a wire story about the Chicago foundation that gives out those ‘genius’ grants. It has the address, out in Chicago. I guess Jonathan was trying to figure out how to apply for one.” Whitney turned to Tess. “End of the line. If you want to find any more, you have to get in as Jonathan.”

  To log on as Jonathan, all Tess had to do was stroke the command button, type in “Ross,” then fill in his password. The computer would give her three chances to get the password right. If she failed to guess correctly, the terminal would freeze and send a message to the internal security system, warning it someone had tried to break in, a message that would probably go ignored until late tomorrow morning when someone reviewed the tapes. No one could the Whitney to the infraction—thanks to the stolen key card and the intern user handle, it couldn’t be proven she had been here—and it could escape notice, just another line in the thousands of messages recorded every day. But it would still be recorded somewhere.

  “So, do you know his password?” Whitney asked Tess.

  “No, but I think I know Jonathan well enough to guess. And I’ve got fifteen tries, right? Three per terminal.”

  “Uh-uh. Too dangerous. Trying to use someone else’s password is grounds for firing. One weird little incident might not ring any bells. But if someone strikes out fifteen times, at one A.M., on all five editorial terminals, they’ll start looking hard. I can’t risk that. It’s one machine or nothing, Tess.”

  With fifteen, Tess had felt cocky. Ten—a cinch. Even five would have seemed a sporting chance. Three was narrow and arbitrary, straight out of the
Brothers Grimm. Being clever wouldn’t be enough. She would have to be lucky.

  She hunched over the screen, feeling like a reporter again. She was on deadline and all she needed was the first word, her lede. Once she had it, all the other words would follow.

  “P-u-l-i-t-z-e-r,” she typed, thinking of Jonathan’s unabashed ambition.

  Strike one! the computer replied.

  “Try his girlfriend’s name,” Whitney whispered in her ear. “Or his middle name. A lot of people use middle names.”

  “I had thought he might use one of his journalism idols,” she said, but typed in D-a-p-h-n-e, anyway.

  Strike two! the computer said, a bit smugly, Tess thought. One more shot.

  Tess closed her eyes. She knew Jonathan. She had him under her fingernails. She just had to dig out the right piece, the incriminating hair or fiber. Their last night together—but he hadn’t given up anything then. He had lied to her that night, told her Abramowitz was inconsequential in the story he was pursuing. While she was hiding the floppy disk in her drawer, he had been hiding far more.

  That wasn’t the night she wanted to remember. It was the time before, the time he didn’t die. Even then, Tess knew now, he had been feeling a little smug and superior—he already knew Abramowitz was Fauquier’s lawyer, and he knew the connection was not incidental. Why would he withhold such information when it might have helped Tyner? Because, whatever he knew, he remained convinced Rock had killed Abramowitz.

  Still, he had been so nice that night, as nice as he had ever been. Perhaps as nice as he could be. They had watched the sun rise. What had they talked about up on the roof? How he had envied her for being from the city, when he was just a suburban mall rat. Her family, her roots here. Their days at the Star. A story about a fire, a fire he couldn’t find. The way the rewrite man had ridiculed Jonathan for the rest of his days at the Star, calling him Sparky. The way Jonathan had gloried in getting a job while the rewrite man went into PR.

  “Trust me,” he had said. “There’s not a day I go to work and I don’t think about Sparky and Nick.”

  Not a day. She had two choices here, but only one chance. She typed in the old nickname, taking special care. The computer blinked, went blank, then, seemingly a million years later, blinked again. Sign-on successful, just a moment please. Tess was now Jonathan Ross.

  Even in his personal basket, paranoid Jonathan had taken steps to keep prying eyes from his notes and stories. He had slugged his stories by the dullest names possible in order to deter browsers. Tax bill. City ordinances. Utility rates. Mayor’s speech. Insurance rates. Sewers. Tess tried the last one, finding a list of prison sources and their numbers.

  Zoning—city. Here was Jonathan’s first interview with Fauquier, transcribed, apparently, from a tape recording. Zoning—county. More Fauquier. But nothing Fauquier hadn’t told her, in fewer words and less time.

  “Check the keyword,” Whitney advised. “He might have assigned the same keyword to all his notes on this.”

  Access issues. Whitney showed Tess how to request the computer to sort the stories with that heading. Within seconds they had a list of eleven files.

  “No printouts,” Whitney hissed. “They make records, too.” Tess nodded and began reading through the various entries, retracing Jonathan’s steps chronologically.

  Apparently he had first met Fauquier in July while doing research for his series on how the first execution would affect life on Death Row. But Fauquier was not to be the focus of the piece. Jonathan was concentrating on another inmate, a cop killer who seemed positively benign alongside Fauquier. He had interviewed Fauquier merely for his assessment of his colleague. Miffed, Fauquier had tried too hard to be outrageous, claiming repeatedly he should be the star of Jonathan’s series, for he was so much more “accomplished.”

  “F: He kills one little cop while he’s high, and you want to write about him? Why, because he says he’s a Christer now and writes letters to the guy’s family? I killed more people than anyone here. If you want to write about us, you have to write about me! That other guy, he’s a nigger, anyway. It’s easy for a nigger to get condemned. But a white man has to be really bad. If I killed some cop while I was on dope, I wouldn’t even be here. It’s just like everywhere else—affirmative action. The standards are so much lower.

  “JR: Well, my purpose is to get readers to understand the humanity of the people here. Focusing on you wouldn’t achieve that. It would be more like Frankenstein—the villagers would storm the jail, torches in hand, ready to execute you.”

  Nice comeback, Jonathan. Much better than my threat to kick his ass.

  The interviews began again after Abramowitz’s death. Fauquier had lured Jonathan back to him with his boast about the fake confession and the cover-up. Then he had teased him languidly, enjoying the attention and, perhaps, a slight sexual charge from boyish Jonathan.

  “Too bad I can’t go see Abramowitz,” Jonathan had typed at the end of one file, a summary of Fauquier’s legal history. “Tess’s friend didn’t do me any favors by killing him.” Tess smiled. That egocentric touch was pure Jonathan, like hearing his voice again.

  The other files were series of facts from Fauquier’s confessions, broken down into categories. Dates. Nothing seemed out of place there. Methods of dispatch. All of Fauquier’s victims had been strangled or their skulls crushed, then buried in well-concealed graves. Victims’ names. Victims’ addresses. Names of the investigators in each case. Where the bodies were found.

  “He left his bodies in some nice places,” Whitney observed, peering over Tess’s shoulder. “State parks and wildlife refuges out in the country, little wilderness areas hidden in the city. Look—Damon Jackson died in a much nicer place than he ever lived. I guess in murder, it’s the same as real estate. Location, location, location.”

  “Location, location, location,” Tess repeated. She turned off the computer.

  “Did you find what you wanted?”

  “I found something. Whether I want it, or can use it, remains to be seen.”

  It was not yet two when she arrived home. Whitney, charged up by their midnight mission, had wanted to go to a bar or an all-night dinner, but Tess’s body was still indifferent to alcohol and food. All she wanted was her bed, solitude and, maybe, a joint.

  Kitty had shoved some mail under her door. Just as Tess’s phone calls sometimes went to the bookstore, her mail inevitably was mixed up, too, going to the front entrance instead of the side. It was seldom anything to mourn. No love letters had been mislaid, or million-dollar checks from Publishers Clearinghouse. Tonight’s offerings were typical. A “Dear Occupant” brochure from a local dating service, Great Expectations. She wondered if Miss Havisham was a satisfied customer. A Victoria’s Secret catalog—she had bought four pairs of underwear from the company three years ago and they continued to send her a catalog every two weeks. A form letter from the state, never good news. Was it already time to get a new driver’s license?

  A thin photocopy fluttered out. Her copy of VOMA’s pink sheet. She had forgotten requesting it and, knowing state government as she did, had never expected to see it in less than the two weeks promised. And then Cecilia had convinced her, more or less, that VOMA was a dead end.

  She studied the blurry copy. Yes, two board members had been added to VOMA the last time the nonprofit renewed its charter, just this spring. Seamon P. and Luisa J. O’Neal. Abramowitz was still listed as the agent and had attached this addendum to the annual tax statement. Hadn’t Pru told Cecilia his involvement was incidental, a onetime irony? Tess felt Abramowitz tugging on her sleeve, trying to point the way, much the way Jonathan had seemed to be guiding her today through the interview with Fauquier and his own computer files.

  They were both leading her in the same direction, to the same place.

  Location, location, location. According to Jonathan’s files, one of Fauquier’s early victims, Damon Jackson, had been discovered behind the O’Neals’ house, along Cross-T
ree Creek. That’s what Fauquier had called it in his confession, although the police report listed it as Little Wyman Falls. Cross-Tree Creek. Little Wyman Falls. If it had not been for the O’Neals’ silly bickering over the name, Tess never would have remembered it.

  Chapter 28

  Tess wanted nothing more than to sleep. If she could have forced herself, she would have squeezed four or five hours of oblivion out of the night’s remains, then gone to the boat house for a good, punishing workout. She would have gone to Jimmy’s and eaten her bagels, glad again that the cook threw them on the griddle the minute she walked in the door. She would have done all her routine things, the things that made her feel strong and capable. She wanted her rut back.

  Instead she stayed up all night, watching the clock, making lists and waiting, for the second time in two days, for state offices to open. At 8:30, a mug of strong coffee in hand, she set herself up in Kitty’s office, working the fax, the phone, and old sources at the secretary of state’s office and the attorney general. It took some coaxing, but by 10 A.M. she had the documents she wanted spread out in front of her. Then, her hand shaking slightly, she called the O’Neals.

  The maid answered, as Tess had expected. She was prepared to play the bully. To her surprise Luisa O’Neal came on the line when she heard who was calling.

  “Oh, dear,” she said, gracious as ever. “I know Shay has a very full schedule today. And we’re leaving for the beach after work. We’re taking a long weekend at our little place in Bethany.”

  A little place on the beach with six bedrooms, five decks, and two Jacuzzis. Tess had seen photos in the Blight’s Sunday magazine last year.

  “Actually, Mrs. O’Neal, I wanted to talk to you.”

  “Oh, dear,” she said again, as though she had longed to visit with Tess. “I have tennis this morning. But I could meet at one-thirty. The girls always like to have lunch after.”