The Caller jl-2

by Alex Barclay

  ‘Fine,’ said Valtry.

  He led them to a bench at the back of the lab and two small ovens with fold-down doors. Beside it was a machine he leaned into to wind a large metal centrifuge.

  ‘What’s that?’ said Joe.

  ‘A cast-off oven,’ said Valtry. ‘You’ll see what it does in a minute. I’ve just wound the centrifuge there and locked it in place.’

  He put on gloves and picked up some tongs, opening the oven and taking out the small plaster cylinder with the tooth-shaped hole at the centre. He placed it on the work bench.

  Kelvin walked past and leaned into the cast-off oven.

  ‘I wound that already,’ said Valtry.

  Kelvin frowned. ‘Well, there’s a screw lying down there that’s popped off, so… did you know that, Mr Valtry? I hope you knew that,’ he said, teasing the boss with the backup of two strangers.

  Valtry blushed. ‘I did know that. I was testing you.’ He laughed badly. ‘Maybe you could put that back on. And wind it again.’

  Kelvin smiled as he did it.

  Valtry unhooked a blowtorch from the side of the machine, pulled down the oven door and lit it from the element glowing orange inside. ‘This flame here is not hot enough to melt the gold, but once I mix it with oxygen…’ He turned a valve on a tall green cylinder beside him and a thin blue flame shot from the torch. ‘I now have a flame that is extremely hot. Three thousand degrees hot. So what we’re going to do is shoot the metal through the hole and when it goes in, now you get a crown made of metal, it’s not made of wax any more.’

  ‘They might need to wear the glasses,’ said Kelvin.

  ‘Yes,’ said Valtry. ‘Can you get our friends some glasses?’

  Kelvin handed them some eye protectors. ‘Look, then look away. Don’t stare too long at it.’

  ‘He’s using gold today,’ said Valtry, ‘so we put the gold ingots into the crucible here. I take the ring-’

  Kelvin pointed to the crucible. ‘Uh, don’t forget to preheat the

  …’

  ‘Thank you, again, Kelvin,’ said Valtry, his voice tight and upbeat. ‘I take my torch and start by preheating the crucible until it’s a nice cherry red. Then I put my ingots into the crucible. With the torch here, I melt the gold until it’s liquid, it takes about sixty seconds. I take the ring out, put it right here in front of the crucible. When I shut the lid, it’s going to start spinning and the centrifugal action shoots the gold right through the hole and into my mould. One, two three…’

  He shut the glass lid and a dazzling circle of white light spun with the centrifuge underneath.

  ‘Maybe we should shut off all the gas and stuff,’ said Kelvin. ‘I can do that.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Valtry.

  Kelvin shut off the torch, pulled out the tube from the gas supply and turned off the oxygen.

  ‘Right, this is done,’ said Valtry. He pushed on a lever at the centre of the machine, pressed a red button, opened the lid and used tongs to take out the plaster ring.

  ‘I’m going to leave that for an hour to let everything go back to room temperature. When I break that open, inside it is a gold tooth. After that, it’s a matter of trimming and polishing. And when that’s done, we start doing all the cosmetic stuff that everybody sees – adding the ceramic or porcelain or whatever. But you need that metal foundation for strength.’

  ‘So it’s the leftovers of that trimming and polishing that gets sent to the refinery,’ said Joe.

  ‘Yes,’ said Valtry.

  ‘OK,’ said Joe. ‘Well thanks for showing us how you work.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Danny. ‘Thanks.’

  Ushi Gahr smiled at them as they walked past. Out in the hallway, Joe turned to Danny. ‘Gas, blowtorches, flames, molten metal… very nice tools for some psycho to have to play with.’

  TWENTY-ONE

  Shaun Lucchesi was stretched out in front of the television with a bottle of beer in his hand and a packet of tortilla chips in his lap.

  ‘For crying out loud,’ said Joe. ‘It’s seven o’clock on a Monday night, Shaun. Do you really think having a beer is a good idea?’

  ‘Uh-huh,’ said Shaun, still looking at the screen. He raised the bottle to his lips.

  Joe watched him until he decided he couldn’t take any more.

  ‘This is all wrong,’ he said, walking over and grabbing the beer out of his hand.

  Shaun sat up. ‘What the hell?’

  ‘I’ve had enough,’ Joe shouted. ‘Your attitude sucks.’

  ‘Yeah, whatever.’

  ‘Stop it,’ said Joe. ‘Just shut the fuck up.’

  Shaun’s mouth dropped open.

  Joe sat down, rubbing his forehead. ‘I apologize,’ he said. He glanced over at Shaun. He looked lost. But his whole family had changed in a year. And he hadn’t spent any of that time dealing with it.

  Joe spoke quietly. ‘Look, Shaun. I’m sorry. I’m worried about you. So’s your mom.’

  Shaun sighed. ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘You’re not,’ said Joe. ‘And I know you know that deep down.’

  Shaun shrugged. Joe was looking at the same bored indifference he showed his father at eighteen. He couldn’t work out if it made it easier or pissed him off more.

  ‘There really is a difference between drinking now and when I was eighteen,’ said Joe.

  ‘Yes,’ said Shaun. ‘You probably wore bell-bottoms while you were doing it.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Joe. ‘But seriously, it was different. We didn’t drink that much, that young.’

  ‘It’s not like I’ve a major problem.’

  ‘Famous last words,’ said Joe. Shaun shrugged.

  ‘Shaun, listen. You’re drinking, heavily, four nights a week. It won’t end well. Why are you drinking so much?’

  ‘I’m not. No-one else is getting crap from their parents about it.’

  ‘Maybe no-one else cares this much about their kids.’

  Shaun rolled his eyes.

  ‘Come on,’ said Joe. ‘I’m talking to you about this calmly. There’s no argument going on here. But let me tell you, there will be.’

  Shaun stared at the floor.

  ‘If you’re drinking to forget… things,’ said Joe. ‘That’s when me and your mom get worried. We know what you’ve been through more than anyone. Your friends don’t. You’re just one part of a big group. No-one there is thinking about each individual person and whether or not it’s a good idea for them to get wasted every night. They don’t care.’

  ‘Yes, they do,’ said Shaun.

  ‘No they don’t. Has anyone had one conversation with you about what happened in Ireland?’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ said Shaun. ‘They know stuff, but not from talking to me.’

  ‘And they still think it’s a good idea for you to get wasted every night.’

  ‘It’s not down to them,’ said Shaun. ‘I’m my own person. I make my own decisions.’

  ‘Well, you’re making some very bad ones. And we’re not gonna stand by and take it. So here’s the deal: you get Saturday nights to go out. Friday, you can catch a movie with Tara or whoever, but no drinking. Every other night of the week, you’re home here. By 10.30.’

  ‘No way,’ said Shaun. ‘No way, Dad. No way.’

  ‘Way,’ said Joe. ‘Way. I’m getting to you before your mom does. She’s coming in here in a minute, but I don’t want her to have to worry about anything, so I’m talking to you now, OK? You’ll see more why we need your cooperation on this, why neither of us need to have to worry our son is going to end up in rehab.’

  ‘That’s so dumb,’ said Shaun.

  Anna walked into the room. ‘Hi.’ She walked over to the sofa and sat beside Shaun. He frowned. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing’s wrong,’ she said. ‘We just have something we’d like to tell you.’

  He waited.

  ‘We’re going to have a baby,’ she said.

  ‘Who?’ said Shaun. He look
ed at them. ‘You?’ His eyes shot wide, rapidly searching both their faces. ‘What?’ He calmed slowly. ‘Oh God,’ he said. ‘You’re not kidding.’

  ‘Just the reaction we were hoping for,’ said Joe.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Anna.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mom,’ he said, leaning across to half-hug her. ‘Congratulations.’ He gave Joe a small smile.

  ‘Your mother and I… we’re very happy,’ said Joe.

  ‘It’s very early to tell you,’ said Anna, ‘but your father thought, just, well, I don’t need a lot of stress. I hope you can help me out with that.’

  Shaun stared at Joe, but looked back at Anna kindly. ‘Sure, Mom. I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m happy for you guys. I mean, it’s weird, but-’

  Joe flashed a glance at him.

  ‘Come on, it’s weird,’ said Shaun. ‘But I guess it could be cool being a big brother.’ He shrugged.

  Joe’s mobile rang. ‘I have to take this,’ he said, walking over to the window. ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Joe, it’s Tom Blazkow. Two things: lab results came back on that second piece of clothing from Trahorne laboratory – we got a match with Ethan Lowry’s blood. And… we got another body.’

  Dean Valtry lived and died in a soulless TriBeCa loft on Duane Street. Alive, he suited the glossy, arctic white space, its angular furniture and carefully placed art. Dead, his blasted forehead and stiffened corpse turned it into a self-conscious installation. He lay fully dressed in a navy pin stripe suit, blue shirt with white collar and cuffs, gold tie and gold cufflinks, slumped against a long low-backed sofa. His mouth hung open.

  Danny and Joe looked down.

  ‘Death don’t do percentages,’ said Danny.

  ‘Shot in the head while he was sitting on his sofa,’ said Joe.

  Dr Hyland looked up and nodded.

  ‘Probably too engrossed watching himself on TV to notice the killer come in,’ said Danny.

  ‘Hey,’ said Bobby, walking over.

  ‘First precinct isn’t as safe as it used to be,’ said Joe.

  ‘No shit,’ said Bobby.

  ‘What happened here?’ said Joe.

  ‘Looking like a twenty-two again, but obviously his face hasn’t had the crap bashed out of it.’

  Joe shook his head. ‘Anyone talk to the neighbors?’ ‘A lot of the apartments are vacant,’ said Bobby. ‘Wealthy owners who come to the city couple of times a year, actors, investors, whatever. The two people who were home heard nothing. The apartments are sound-proofed and are so goddamn big, they might as well be in different buildings.’

  ‘Let’s take a walk around,’ said Joe.

  ‘At least it’s not hard to see everything,’ said Danny. ‘Pass around some cheese and wine and we could all be at a gallery opening.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Hyland, ‘and Valtry here is the work of some edgy new up-and-comer with an eye for the macabre.’

  Joe nodded. ‘Back in a while.’

  He walked with Danny through the open plan apartment, moving around the crime scene techs.

  ‘So,’ said Joe. ‘The day we find a definite link between Trahorne Refining and Valtry’s lab, Valtry winds up dead.’

  ‘Yup,’ said Danny. ‘You think he was part of the whole-’

  ‘I think he knew who was. And I think they paid him a visit tonight.’

  ‘It had to have been someone who worked in the lab,’ said Danny.

  ‘Maybe we need to look further – at suppliers, whoever had to come in and out of the building, whoever could have had access to those paper drums or packages going in and out.’

  ‘But we spoke to everyone from the cleaning staff up,’ said Danny.

  ‘Well, we missed someone.’

  The tour of the apartment didn’t take long – a vast, clean space, all of it as tidy as the lab, as perfectly kept as Valtry’s office.

  ‘He was not lying about his attention to detail,’ said Joe. ‘Look – alphabetized CDs, books – who does that?’

  ‘You do, you retard.’

  ‘Not this much, I don’t.’

  Danny looked at him like he had lost his mind. ‘Joe. You’re the neatest freak I know.’ He looked around the room. ‘Makes our job easier,’ said Danny. ‘No searching around for anything. I’d say every piece of paper in every file in those cabinets is in the right place.’

  Joe used a glove to slide open one of the drawers. The tabs were colour-coded, their titles neatly printed. Danny shrugged. ‘There are not enough hours in the day for this kind of shit.’

  ‘Yeah, well, if you organize shit in the first place, you have more hours in the day, because you don’t spend them trying to find things.’

  ‘Jesus, get a life,’ said Danny.

  Joe walked over to the kitchen counter and picked up the phone. He scrolled through the numbers, writing down everything from the call log. He did the same with Valtry’s cell phone.

  ‘Last number dialled was at 6.30 p. m.,’ said Joe.

  ‘Probably when he got home from work,’ said Danny.

  They walked into the bedroom, which had a white brick half-wall separating it from the living space. The bed was huge, custom-made, four-poster draped in white muslin.

  ‘He lived here alone?’ said Danny.

  ‘Yup,’ said Joe.

  The area was untouched, a peaceful space, far removed from the scene at the other end of the apartment.

  ‘OK,’ said Joe. ‘There’s something missing in this apartment.’

  ‘Heart,’ said Danny.

  ‘Yeah, apart from that.’

  ‘Furniture.’

  Joe shook his head. ‘Equipment. Machines, all that shit we saw at his lab.’

  ‘But he works at his lab, doesn’t he?’

  ‘When he was showing us around, did you think the guy was really at home with it? Or comfortable in that environment? When he was watching himself on his television screen, I looked at his calendar and almost every evening he had a social engagement. And he’s not doing technician work in the day time. He’s not doing it at night. Maybe he’s doing it at the weekend, but now we know he isn’t. There’s nothing here.’

  ‘Yeah, but he’s the big boss. He doesn’t want to be fooling around with ovens and little scalpels and shit. He says to us, “what I do is fine art” means, “what my minions do is fine art”.’

  Joe shook his head. ‘Remember the Asian girl who said we should ask Valtry to show us around? I think it’s because she had her doubts about something.’

  They moved into the hallway.

  ‘So he just takes credit for his workers’ talent,’ said Danny. ‘That’s what bosses do. When we get the psycho who did this, you think it’s going to be us up there on the podium?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Joe, ‘but Valtry was doing more than that. He was producing physical work that made his lab rats think he was great.’

  ‘Yeah and…?’

  ‘And I don’t think it was him who was producing it,’ said Joe.

  They walked back to Bobby.

  ‘Where’s the doorman?’ said Joe.

  ‘Shook-up downstairs,’ said Bobby. ‘Guy by the name of Cliff.’

  Joe turned to Danny. ‘Let’s go talk to him.’

  They took the elevator down to the first floor. Cliff sat, pale and sweating on an orange and grey sofa in front of them. ‘I didn’t see anyone come in,’ he said. He held his right hand over his left arm. ‘I’m sorry. I got heart problems.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ said Joe. ‘Take it easy. You need a glass of water?’

  ‘No thanks. I’m good.’

  ‘You were here all evening,’ said Joe.

  ‘Yes,’ said Cliff. ‘I’m always here when I’m supposed to be here.’

  ‘That’s good. And no-one came to see Mr Valtry?’

  ‘No-one came through the front door.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘But we have a back entrance here. We got a lot of personalities living here, entertainment industry, models, business people and they
like their privacy.’

  ‘There’s no security detail back there?’ said Joe.

  ‘No and that’s the way they like it.’

  ‘So if I had a visitor, I can tell them where that door is and they walk right in.’

  ‘Well, they would need your private code, each apartment has one, but sure, they can come in, we’re not gonna know. A car could pull right up to that back door and anyone who’s been given the code can come in.’

  ‘Do you have a code?’

  ‘I have a code. Residents set and reset their own codes. Your neighbor won’t know your code unless you want him to, but there’s no reason you would need to give him that. If something bad happens, whoever’s code was entered can be traced back to them. But that hasn’t happened yet… until now… and unfortunately the guy whose code was used isn’t around to tell us about it.’

  ‘But Valtry had to have known who he was letting in.’

  ‘Yeah, obviously not well enough. Valtry was one of the good guys, would have trusted anyone. We’re all really sorry this happened.’

  ‘So are we, Cliff.’

  ‘So what’s up?’ said Danny as they walked to the car.

  ‘What do you mean what’s up?’ said Joe.

  ‘You’re acting weird.’

  ‘What’s up,’ said Joe, ‘is that my wife is pregnant.’

  Danny stopped. ‘Jesus. Well, congratulations. That’s… great news. Is it?’

  Joe sighed. ‘If I was a better person, yeah, maybe.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘I guess it’s good news. Least we made Shaun think it was.’

  ‘Chicks dig guys with babies.’

  Joe laughed, then quickly put a hand to his jaw. ‘Shit.’

  ‘I’ll take the kid to the park for you,’ said Danny. ‘I got no problem with that. I’ll tell him quietly, but loud enough for the hot chicks – Mommy is with the angels.’

  Joe laughed again, despite his jaw. ‘You’re a sick fuck.’

  TWENTY-TWO

  Bobby Nicotero walked into the office at Manhattan North and went straight for Joe’s desk.

  ‘Can I have a word please, Joe?’