There is no such thing as privacy anymore. Everyone's existence is completely open to bureaucratic scrutiny and what Uncle Sam doesn't know, his minions can suppose, and that supposition can be designated as fact.
Don't try to lie. They already know the answers. Embellish the facts and they'll nail you to the wall. The only way you can beat them is to keep your mouth shut and play dumb. Not real dumb, just casually dumb. It isn't easy, but it works.
The two bright-eyed, rosy-cheeked young men in dark suits, smart shirts, and foulard ties who sat opposite me in the client's chairs had introduced themselves and shown their Homeland Security credentials without being asked. They weren't being polite. It was supposed to intimidate me.
So I took my .45 out from my shoulder holster, laid it on the desk while I tugged out my wallet, and flashed them my New York State PI's license. They just gave it and me the fish eye, but the way I slid the old, well-oiled Colt .45 back in its leather gave them something to think about.
At least they were polite. Harvey Leland, the one with the tight curly hair, started the conversation: "This young man this morning—can you give us the details?"
"Have you spoken to Captain Chambers?" Of course I knew they had.
Leland nodded.
"Well, I don't have anything to add. If the cops have it, you're going to want to confiscate that kid's cell phone and give it the full treatment. He was getting ready to report to somebody."
"What was that young man doing on that rooftop?"
"You'd have to ask him. If you could ask him."
"You were at the university when you spotted him."
"Actually, my secretary spotted a glint of glass on the rooftop. We were visiting the Hurleys. After the subway incident, I've taken their kids under my protective wing."
The one with the GI haircut said, "All right, then, Mr. Hammer. Let's start with the subway incident. What made you think the man you shot at in the subway—"
I stopped him right there. "I didn't shoot at him. I shot at his gun, and hit it."
The youthful forehead creased. "Wouldn't that have been a difficult shot?"
"Not for me." I nodded toward the trophy plaques on the wall. "If I'd wanted to kill the son of a bitch, I would have taken him out with a head shot. If you've done your homework, gentlemen, you know I'm capable."
For a few seconds, neither had anything to say.
Harvey Leland coughed gently into his palm, then asked, "Did you know Matthew and Jenna Hurley prior to this individual trying to rob them?"
"Trying to rob them? He was running after them with a gun in his hand—a gun with a sound suppressor. This was no casual robbery, gentlemen. That guy was damned determined to get those kids."
"Why, do you suppose?"
Did they know about the Goliath bone? Surely through the federal connection to the Hurleys and the university, the word was known in Washington. Were they trying to entrap me?
"I'd just wrapped up another, unrelated case," I said noncommitally.
The GI haircut Fed spoke up again. "The Hurley boy was carrying something."
"Yeah, he was."
"Did you know what he had with him?"
"Hell, I didn't know him. How would I know what he was lugging around? I called my friend in the NYPD, reported the incident, and we all spent much of the night at headquarters answering questions. Fully. Recorded in reports you've no doubt heard and/or read. This is old news, gentlemen—what else do you want?"
I wasn't giving them anything without direct questions. If they wanted to know what I knew, they'd have to reveal some of what they knew.
The two young agents exchanged a glance and stood up. In a way, I suppose I was an enigma to them. At the moment, they hadn't gotten a handle on anything here, but they or others like them would be back. They'd run all the details down in their minds, feed them into their computers, add in what else they found out, and they'd be back.
We shook hands once again and they left.
Velda emerged from the outer office. She stood there framed in the doorway in a white blouse and black skirt that made no attempt to be sexy, but didn't have to on that woman.
"Anything?" she asked.
I shook my head. "Fishing expedition on their part."
"How about you?" She arched an eyebrow. "Haul anything onto the deck?"
"No. But my gut says they know all about the Goliath bone ... and yet they don't bring it up."
"What do you make of that?"
"Based on the benefit of my many years of experience, doll, I can tell you with complete confidence ... I have no damn idea."
She smiled, shrugged, and went back to her post.
God, they'd been young. An old soldier like me had no business getting tied up in something that should have ended in the Valley of Elah a long, long time ago. I had tangled with the hoods of several generations, the creeps that had been taking civilized society apart for their own greedy benefit. I had shot some of them and some of them had shot me, but now I was standing on another battlefield, where the stakes were so much higher and all the enemy guns were loaded up with bullets whose noses spelled my name out all in caps.
And after all these years, here I was finally about to get married. And Velda? Not only did she not object to this new war, but she was ready to back me up, all the way....
I picked up the phone receiver and punched in Pat's number. When he heard my hello, he asked, "Did the boys in the suits stop by?"
"We had a short talk."
"You know," he said, a chuckle in his voice, "they didn't even know who you were. Never heard of you, son."
"Fame is fleeting, Pat."
"Got time to squeeze in a late lunch at Betty's?"
"Sure."
Only there was no Betty's. That was code for a place where Pat and I could meet when things were running too damn hot to chance having anyone hear our conversation.
A couple of scarred-up chairs, a card table, and Pat Chambers were waiting for me in the back room of a squalid little barbershop that a bookie had operated out of till somebody shot him for betting he could get away with not paying off.
I'd brought two coffees along from the corner Dunkin' Donuts, and we sat there grinning at each other.
"Still at it, at our age, Mike?"
"The fun never stops, Pat."
"Someday it will. You wait and see." He sipped his coffee. "Like you thought, those .22s held a light load, Mike."
"Got to hand it to the'D.C. lab boys, anyway."
"They are the best."
"Slugs domestically manufactured?"
"Plain old, plain old. Can get 'em at any gun shop."
"No lead to the shooter, I suppose?"
Pat shook his head. "The information went into the system and, if there are any matches, we'll know eventually."
" That's comforting."
He frowned. "Mike, those Homeland Security boys aren't the only interested parties in this mess. I heard from the FBI today, too. There's talk of a joint task force."
"To what end? As a sop to the public?"
He shrugged. "More like a statement to the terrorists. Counting that guy you may or may not have shot in that alley, we've got three dead Middle Eastern types and a still-at-large shooter with a .22 target pistol."
"Come on, Pat, he flew the coop."
"Well, he's not in our coop." Pat sighed. "Not that our saber rattling means anything to this enemy. They have their own agenda, obviously."
"Pat, what's the scoop on these government agencies?" I sipped coffee and, when he didn't reply right away, I said, "Those Homeland Security boys were awfully cute today. They didn't get much out of me out for fear I'd get something out of them."
He shrugged. "We see these spooks floating around. But my corner of Homicide isn't very involved with their kind. We get cases where we know the victim and the perps are already indicated. Now and then these Feds and spy types move in and take over—like today after that Arab kid of yours did the swan dive."
"You get anything on him before they swooped in?"
"Just that he was an illegal immigrant. Jordanian."
I shifted in the hard chair. "Pat, these Homeland kiddies didn't mention the Goliath bone. They have to know about it by now. But they just danced around."
"My take is these Washington spooks don't buy into it."
"What? Why the hell not?"
"They dismiss it. It's just some old artifact. Who's to say it's really Goliath, anyway?"
"That's bullshit, Pat. They're playing it down, but they know what's at stake. So nobody can prove absolutely that bone belonged to Goliath—so what? Who can prove Christ rose from the dead? Who can prove Allah wants 'infidels' like us wiped out? Proof doesn't come into it. It's faith."
Pat drew in a breath. I knew him well—he was trying to decide whether to share something with me. I gave him a look, but he just half-smiled and shook his head.
"Mike, there is this guy I know with Army Intelligence. Arab American who's infiltrated various Islamic groups that we've been keeping under surveillance."
"Finally somebody's getting smart."
"He says that in the last forty-eight hours, there's a lot of loose talk about suitcase-size nukes. This Goliath bone of yours—"
"Of mine!"
"—this Goliath bone of yours, if it stokes the fires, God knows what we're looking at. Full-scale war in the Middle East maybe, spilling out of Iraq and into every damn where."
"Suitcase nukes, huh? Too bad they have so much trouble lining up suicide bombers, or we might have a problem."
Pat's eyebrows went up. "Two A-bombs stopped a war with Japan. One suitcase nuke could start one with some rogue state."
"They'd have to get 'em in here," I said. "We have border guards, aerial surveillance, dogs trained to sniff out any damn thing—"
"Yeah, if you're smuggling pot. Can the wishful thinking, Mike. How many thousands of miles of borders do we have to patrol? Immigrants, drugs, weapons—all that stuff comes across our patrolled lines every damn day. And you don't even want to know about cargo containers and the ports! Not if you want to sleep tonight."
I was smiling but it was glum. "I don't think sleep is what's called for. These terrorists are scattered, but they're organized. Not like us, but like wolves. They kill and destroy without concern for the consequences, and their coloration keeps them hidden."
"Sounds like somebody I know."
"I'll take that as a compliment."
Pat's gray eyes were studying me like I was a one-man lineup. "Can I ask you something, Mike? And get a straight answer?"
"Shoot."
"What was going on this morning at that NYU research center? What was a van from your playmates Secure Solutions doing there?"
"You'd have to ask the university."
"No, I'm asking you. You're up to something. You moved that damn thing, didn't you?"
I grinned at him. "What damn thing?"
"The bone, Mike. The Goliath bone."
I stood. "Come on, Pat. You know it's just some old artifact. Who's to say it's Goliath, anyway? ... Don't thank me for the coffee. It can be your treat next time."
The first flight Paul Vernon had been able to get was a red-eye, but at least the plane landed on time. He was ambling from the gate area into the terminal when he saw me wave and picked up the pace to join Velda and me, flashing his infectious smile.
A handsome devil with a full head of salt-and-pepper hair and a purely pepper beard, he was wearing jeans and the long-sleeved gray USC sweatshirt that was his Californian's idea of being ready for a New York winter. Fortunately for him, that winter had lately thrown in the towel, trading snow for rain.
Lugging his little carry-on bag, he held out his free hand for me to shake and said, "Sure glad to see you, old buddy. Nice to see a monster that still has some flesh on its bones .... This must be Velda."
She smiled and gave him a kiss on the cheek, as if they were old friends, which they were, from hearing so much about each other over the years.
The three of us walked together, Paul in the middle. It was so early the restaurants and newsstands hadn't opened for business yet, and the airport was fairly underpopulated, not yet quite awake.
I asked, "Take you away from anything important?"
"Hell, no. All those bones in the tar pits have names, and the specialists have a good month's work to clean and sort them out. I'll have all the time I'll need, if this is half as interesting as you indicated." He winked at Velda and told me, "How did you ever rate such a beautiful assistant?"
"The beauties of this world always love the beasts," I reminded him. "Didn't you ever see King Kong?"
"All three versions ... I suppose she carries a concealed weapon, too."
"She carries quite a few concealed weapons."
"She ever shoot anybody?"
Velda's mouth tightened in a small smile; she was getting a kick out of being talked about.
"Only rival beasts," I said.
It had started to rain again. At the office we were the first ones there, except for the doorman, who was keeping dry under the entrance canopy. He nodded good morning, and I told him my guest would possibly be going out later to ship something for me and was not to be bothered with any inspection rigamarole.
Once upstairs, with the office door locked behind us, I went to the closet and lifted the false bottom of the compartment in the floor and removed the original Goliath bone, which had fit snugly within. That compartment had hidden many things over the years, from money to machine guns, but this was its first historical relic.
I laid Matthew and Jenna's discovery, plump with bubble wrap, on Velda's desk. I didn't unwrap it. I took in Paul's awestruck expression and nodded at him to do the honors.
Until now, Paul's decorum had never slipped in my presence, but this was a rare moment in a life that was no stranger to discovery and wonder. His breathing had grown noticeably heavy, his eyes taking on a glaze while his tongue flicked nervously across his lips.
I didn't say anything.
Neither did Velda.
We were both getting a kick out of this archeologist who'd seen it all and then some behave like a kid with a big fat birthday present to open. Slowly, he undid the tapes, then unwound the bubble wrap and unveiled a white cloth swaddling that he did not remove before his hands ran over the contours of the Goliath bone like a lovesick fool caressing the curves of a fully clothed lover he'd not yet seen naked. Then, with an intake of breath, he flipped open the wrapping and his eyes widened in sheer amazement.
I let him have several minutes of visual inspection, including the use of the magnifying glass from Velda's desk, as well as gentle touching of the white surface, before I said, "What do you make of it?"
Finally he told me in a very soft voice, "It's a real bone, all right."
"Yeah, a bona fide bone. Jeez, Paul, I could have told you that." His eyes continued to travel the bone's contours. "It's a femur from a Homo sapiens that had to be at least ten feet tall."
"What are we talking, Bigfoot maybe?"
He shook his head almost irritably. " We have no evidence that Bigfoot exists or ever did. But this bone has all the earmarks of being of human origin. I've never seen anything like it before. No one has."
I grinned at him. "You know whose bone that is, Paul?" He swallowed thickly. "There's no way to prove it, Mike."
"I said, do you know?"
He swallowed again and nodded. " When you mentioned the Valley of Elah, I knew. When I was a kid, my mother read me the tale, not from the Bible, but from a storybook with pictures—colorful paintings that depicted the grandly uniformed giant threatening the opposing army, scaring the crap out of them with nobody responding to the challenge until a young boy stepped out with a sling and took care of that giant bully with one little pebble from a stream. I said to my mother, a little kid did that? And you know what she said to me? She said, 'He had help, Paul. He didn't do it all by himself.'"
I waited for his distant look to fade and then, all business, I asked, "How well could you duplicate that artifact?"
He frowned. "Well, I can't give you perfection..."
"What can you give me?"
For a full ten seconds Paul was lost in deep thought, calculating how he would proceed. Finally he turned to look first at Velda, then at me. "This is not to be repeated to anyone. You understand that?"
"Give me a break, Paul. Haven't you filled in the missing parts of prehistoric skeletons for top museums all over the world?"
"Yes. We've taken old bones, not from the same species at all, but reshaped them to fit the intended purpose and placed them on exhibit for the general public's pleasure. It's a common practice and pays well, too. The spectators can't begin to spot the false parts from the true."
"I need better than that, Paul. I'll settle if I have to, but—"
He held up a hand. "Mike, I can make a dupe so real an expert would have to examine it very minutely to tell what it really was. And it would have to be a top expert."
"How would you manage it?"
He shrugged. "There are many old bones—mammoths, for example—large enough to carve out a replica. The procedure I won't bother to explain to you, because it involves craftsmanship by hand as well as laser and computer tech. Suffice to say I can render the faux artifact chemically so that only under acute and expert detection could anyone discern its true age. The size would be exact, the surface totally consistent with longtime burial, the shape the same as the real thing. Getting the surface color exactly right could be the hard part, but who the hell would know? There's nothing to compare it with."
Then I asked him the most improbable question of all. "How long will this take, Paul?"
"For one duplicate?"
"For three."
He just laughed. "Do I have to work alone?"
"Yes."
"Please tell me this isn't a freebie, Mike. Getting close to this particular relic is a rush, almost as exciting as meeting Velda here ... but I'm going to really have to burn some midnight oil."
[Mike Hammer 14] - The Goliath Bone Page 12