A Slow Walk to Hell

by Patrick A. Davis

  “This the last one, Martin,” Simon said.

  He was holding out a tape to me. As I took it from him, I read the name on the side.

  Harris.

  Another piece of the puzzle—the key piece—slipped into place. We now understood why Congressman Harris, a man with a reputation for integrity, had become involved with a disreputable political guru like Slater.

  I shook my head as I set the tape on the desk. Simon had called Harris an unwilling participant. But blackmail or not, he had participated and five people were dead.

  So much for his integrity.

  “How many?” Simon asked, contemplating the tapes on the desk.

  “Forty-eight,” Amanda answered. “But there are only twenty-eight individuals. Four tapes are Talbot’s. Probably the originals of what we saw.”

  “Where the hell are the rest of them?” Enrique asked, confronting Crenshaw. “There must be hundreds more. Where are they?”

  “This is all of them,” Crenshaw said. “There are forty-eight—”

  “Bullshit,” Enrique said flatly.

  “Think about it,” he said. “What’s the benefit of continually taping a specific client? There isn’t any.”

  “What about the other guests who have stayed in the bungalows over the years?” Enrique demanded. “Where are their tapes?”

  “The vast majority we didn’t bother to tape—You going to let me answer or not?”

  Enrique remained silent, glowering.

  “Mr. Slater,” Crenshaw continued, “was very selective. He knew he was engaged in a high-risk endeavor. He only pressured individuals who he was certain wouldn’t go to the authorities and would be of use to him. That’s another reason he restricted the number of tapings. To minimize the risk that a video might be misplaced or stolen, perhaps find its way to the authorities.”

  Enrique squinted at him, trying to determine if Crenshaw was lying. “Bullshit,” he announced again, making his decision.

  But I saw the logic of what Crenshaw was saying. I said, “I noticed there’s no tape marked with General Baldwin’s name.”

  “No,” Crenshaw said. “To avoid confusion, Mr. Slater only marked the tapes with the people he was targeting. Their partners are referenced in the ledger. It’s in the safe.”

  Simon reached inside it.

  I said to Crenshaw, “You’re telling me Slater never targeted General Baldwin for blackmail?”

  “Not to my knowledge. Mr. Slater’s criterion for videotaping someone was whether they could be politically useful.”

  “Slater threatened General Baldwin with the tape last night.”

  Crenshaw shrugged, cinching his robe tight around him. “I wouldn’t know about that.”

  Amanda asked, “What about money?”

  Crenshaw’s brow wrinkled.

  “Money,” she repeated. “Surely Mr. Slater blackmailed people for money.”

  “He didn’t,” Crenshaw said. “Mr. Slater only sought influence. Power.”

  “Like controlling the president of the United States.”

  Crenshaw was silent.

  “He’s lying,” Enrique said. “There have to be more tapes. Look at the size of this place. It cost millions. He’s lying.”

  “There are only forty-eight tapes,” Simon said.

  He was staring into a green ledger. He shook his head and closed it. He had the same expression of deep sadness that we’d noticed at the Days Inn.

  “What is it?” Amanda asked. “What did you see?”

  “A name.”

  “Whose name?”

  Instead of a reply, Simon told Crenshaw to play the Harris tape.

  Crenshaw walked over to TV cabinet and inserted the video into the VCR. Stepping back, he said to Simon. “The remote is on the desk, Lieutenant.”

  As Simon picked it up, Crenshaw gave him a tiny smile. “You really didn’t know?”

  “I didn’t want to know,” Simon said.

  He extended the remote and stood frozen. As if with great effort, his thumb slowly depressed a button. Seconds later, we realized why he was reluctant to view this video.

  When the image appeared, Amanda gave a little gasp and my knees almost buckled. We’d mentally braced ourselves for several scenarios, all involving Congressman Harris. Nothing prepared us for seeing two nude women interlocked in each others arms. Even though their faces were shielded by a wild mass of hair, we knew who they had to be. One was a tall and black, the other a slender blonde.

  “I can’t believe it,” Amanda said. “I can’t.”

  But we had to believe it because the blonde woman brushed aside her hair and we found ourselves staring at the face of Teresa Harris.

  45

  No one spoke. We couldn’t.

  A voice in my head told me it couldn’t be true. Slater had been a TV producer. He must have staged this somehow, altered the image with some kind of special effects trick. The bright and beautiful Teresa Harris wouldn’t be involved in a lesbian affair with her personal assistant.

  But of course it wasn’t a trick. In our hearts, we knew we were staring at reality. Teresa Harris and her assistant were not only lovers.

  They were killers.

  I rubbed my face hard, thinking I should have at least considered this possibility. The reason I hadn’t was because I’d focused on the obvious. I’d assumed the killers had been men. Women don’t kill in such a brutal fashion. They don’t torture people to death. Certainly not their own nephew. They don’t.

  My mind shifted back to the clues that had been there all along. Subtle, but they were there.

  The height disparity between the killers, one tall and the other much shorter.

  The closeness of the killers to Talbot; why he let them into the house.

  Major Tenpas’s statement to me: Major Coller is separating from the Air Force…He’s going to work as an administrative assistant for Mrs. Harris.

  The absence of an alibi; Teresa Harris hadn’t campaigned with her husband in Pennsylvania.

  Simon’s comment to Amanda: I want so much to be wrong. Can you understand that?

  And Harris’s admonition to the Secret Service agent: You’ve already screwed up enough for one day, Hassall. That singular comment should have been a huge red flag. Hassall’s job was protection. His screwup must have been that he’d failed in that duty.

  And lost his charge, Teresa Harris.

  No, I should have known. The clues were there, if I’d only paid attention. Even now, I still had difficulty believing what I was viewing on the screen. How could this stunningly beautiful woman kill all those—

  I frowned. Coller’s murder? How could she have pulled off Coller’s murder?

  I asked Simon if Teresa Harris was an expert marksman.

  “Exceptionally so,” he said. “It was her discipline in the Olympics.”

  “Excuse me?” Amanda said. “She was a cross-country skier.”

  “Not exactly,” Simon said. “She competed in the biathlon.”

  Which meant Teresa Harris had spent years shooting at targets with a rifle. “Jesus,” Amanda said.

  Coupled with the church janitor’s description of the killers, this fact explained why Simon had harbored suspicions of Teresa Harris. What it didn’t explain was how someone could be in two places at once.

  I said to him, “So how did she manage Coller’s killing? We saw her and her assistant…”

  “Abigail Gillette.”

  “Board the helicopter. Teresa Harris couldn’t have driven to Talbot’s apartment in time to murder him. Not from Harris’s home.”

  “Perhaps the helicopter dropped off the women en route.”

  “She ditched her Secret Service security a second time?” Preposterous. Agent Hassall would never allow himself to be burned twice.

  Simon passed on a response. He didn’t seem concerned about explaining away this inconsistency. I wondered why, since it had bothered him a great deal, back at the rectory.

  “A man,” Aman
da said, highlighting another problem.

  “Officer Hannity seemed convinced the person in the car was a man.”

  “From the height,” Simon said. “That’s why he concluded the driver was male.”

  “So what are you saying? You think Gillette was the person in the car?”

  Another diffident shrug. Simon making it clear he had no desire to discuss this.

  A warning bell chimed in my head. Yet again, his behavior indicated he was withholding information—

  “Here it comes,” Crenshaw announced. “You don’t want to miss it. Mrs. Harris has varied sexual tastes.”

  We all looked at him. He was focused on the screen, his eyes shiny. He murmured, “Such a shame. He was such a good looking man.”

  Amanda said, “Mrs. Harris is bi sexual?”

  Crenshaw didn’t answer her. He was fixated on the television.

  On screen, we saw the women sit up and look toward the foot of the bed, at something or someone off camera. Teresa Harris pouted seductively and flashed a kittenish smile. Her assistant, Abigail Gillette, began motioning insistently. Both women giggled. They kissed on the lips and looked again toward the person—apparently the unseen man—who was in the room. The women smiled provocatively and cupped their hands in a slutty, come-on gesture, urging the man to join them.

  We glimpsed an arm at the lower edge of the screen. A man’s arm. Teresa Harris pulled on his hand and the man tumbled between the women. He was nude except for his briefs. The women playfully pounced on him. Teresa Harris pressed her face down upon his, gave him a violent kiss and rubbed his crotch.

  “Who is he?” Enrique said. “Can anyone tell?”

  There were arms and legs everywhere. Teresa Harris’s face and hair completely covered the man’s. He struggled to free himself, but she continued to cling to him, her mouth pressed against his lips. I should be disgusted by what I was watching, but I couldn’t turn away. Teresa Harris had been an athlete. Her body was lithe and spectacular. She exuded a primal, animalistic sexuality.

  It was exciting to watch.

  Seconds later, Teresa Harris released her grip on the man and pushed away. And that’s when we finally saw his face.

  Simon’s only reaction was a low hiss of disapproval. Because of the ledger, he’d known what to expect. The rest of us were slack jawed, reeling. We never considered that the male lover would be this particular man. It was unthinkable. Gay men don’t have sex with women. And they certainly don’t have sex with female family members.

  But on screen, that was precisely what was happening.

  Teresa Harris wet her lips and buried her face in the crotch of her nephew, Franklin Talbot.

  As the sex act continued, Talbot looked awkward and uncomfortable. His eyes floated around the room, looking everywhere, but at his aunt. It was obvious he wasn’t enjoying himself.

  So what the hell was he doing there?

  Abigail Gillette joined in and both women worked on Talbot. It soon became apparent he was responding physically. The deviancy was too much. One by one, we turned away from the television. First Amanda, Enrique, and me. Crenshaw remained riveted on the screen, his breathing labored. It creeped me out.

  Amanda glared disgustedly at Crenshaw. To Simon, she said, “I think we know how it ends.”

  No reaction. Simon was looking at the screen with a distracted expression. Not so much watching as thinking, trying to understand.

  Amanda said impatiently, “Anytime, Simon.”

  That remark got through and he raised the remote. When the tape kept running, we looked to him quizzically. He was staring past us, toward the doorway. For an instant, I detected what appeared to be an expression of relief. But that didn’t make sense because of what Simon said next.

  “Put the gun down,” he ordered.

  Crenshaw gave a strangled cry and the rest of us spun around.

  Him?

  46

  General Sam Baldwin’s tall frame filled the doorway, a small automatic in his hand. He wore tan slacks, cordovan loafers, and a navy sports coat embroidered with his family crest. Despite his preppy attire, he looked like hell. His lean face appeared puffy and haggard and there were dark bags under his eyes. Focusing on me, he said, “I’m sorry, Marty. I have to do this.”

  My shock gave way to cold rage. “You fucking son of a bitch. You were part of it, all along. You used me.”

  “Marty…Marty…” Sam shook his head dismissively. “You’re something. You really are. I thought you were supposed to be a bright detective.”

  “Coller,” I said. “You killed Coller. It had to be you. It couldn’t be anyone else.”

  The head shaking stopped. “You’re fucking crazy.”

  “They threatened to release the tape unless you took out Coller. So you did it. Blew him away. You couldn’t have it get out that a Baldwin was anything but a perfect soldier. After all, what would your father think when he realized his own son was—”

  “Don’t,” he said. “Don’t say it.”

  I looked right at him, saw his shame.

  “Gay,” I announced loudly. “You’re gay, Sam. Everyone here knows it. Pretty soon, the entire country will know it. Guess what? No one’s going to give a damn who you slept with. You’re a murderer. A goddamn murderer who—”

  “Shut the hell up, Marty.”

  “You going to shoot us all? Forget it. One of us will take you out. It was all for nothing, Sam. Ironic, huh? People are going to remember the Baldwin name, all right. Not because you’re gay, but because—”

  “I said shut up.”

  I’d pushed him too far. His temper kicked in and he looked as mad as I’d ever seen him. His lip was curled into a snarl and he was shaking with rage. He pointed the gun at me and for an instant, I thought he was going to shoot me.

  “You goddamn son of a bitch. You have no right. You don’t understand—”

  The bullet.

  I kept waiting for the impact of the bullet. My only chance to go for my gun. I reached down, hoping Sam kept talking long enough—

  “Stop!”

  We both froze, looking to Simon. He was glaring at us. Beside him, I noticed Amanda had placed her fingers on her weapon, ready to take Sam out if that proved necessary.

  But Enrique’s hand wasn’t anywhere near his holster. And he appeared completely relaxed. That threw me. Enrique was was usually the one who was spring-loaded to react first and ask question later. It was as if he didn’t understand the threat Sam posed—

  “Stop it, both of you,” Simon said. He swung around to me. “You’re mistaken. General Baldwin killed no one.”

  I stared at him as if he was certifiable. “Simon, it had to be him. Teresa Harris couldn’t have killed Coller. We know it wasn’t Colonel Kelly. That leaves only—”

  “It wasn’t General Baldwin.”

  I pointed to my ear. “And this? You said the shooter was trying to miss me, us. That only makes sense if the shooter was Sam.”

  “You’re wrong, Martin. It wasn’t him. The general is here only because I asked him to come.”

  “Huh?”

  Simon nodded to Crenshaw, who was cowering behind the desk. “General Baldwin might have been of use in gaining access to the grounds, had Mr. Crenshaw not cooperated.”

  My eyes were on Sam. He was nodding, his anger dropping below the homicidal level.

  This was all coming in too fast for me to understand. Before I could voice my next question, Amanda beat me to it. “What about the gun? Why does General Baldwin have a gun?”

  Simon had no answer. He told Sam to put his gun down.

  “Sorry, Lieutenant,” Sam said, keeping his weapon level. “It’s insurance.”

  “For?”

  “I can’t allow you to destroy more lives. Franklin wouldn’t have wanted that. It’s why they killed him. He was going to expose all this.” He looked right at the tapes on the desk.

  His message was clear. A tense silence filled the room. We watched Simon, know
ing he couldn’t agree.

  “I take it,” he said, “that you intend to destroy the tapes.”

  “Not all of them, Lieutenant. I realize you need the ones on Major Talbot and Mrs. Harris to prove your case. You keep those; I destroy the rest and the ledger.” He glanced at the computer on Crenshaw’s desk. “I also erase the membership list stored on there.”

  “If I refuse…”

  Sam shifted his gun until it was aimed at Simon’s chest. “I’m not asking, Lieutenant.”

  Again my eyes went to Enrique, who still appeared calm. It made no sense. Simon was being threatened. Why wouldn’t he display some concern or at least—

  And then the reason came to me in a sudden moment of clarity.

  Simon’s gaze rose from Sam’s gun to his face. “You’re destroying evidence, General. It will make proving the case more difficult.”

  “You’ll have the crucial tapes and my testimony. Once you apply the pressure, those involved will crack. It’s already worked with Crenshaw. Slater will do the same thing. That bastard doesn’t want to go down for five murders. You’ll get your conviction, Lieutenant. I promise you.”

  Simon looked conflicted. He obviously didn’t want to agree to Sam’s terms. At least that’s how I read him until I detected something on Enrique’s face that shouldn’t have been there. It was the suggestion of a smile.

  My suspicion evolved into a certainty.

  By now, Amanda had also noticed Enrique’s reaction. She was frowning, cycling through explanations. Her eyebrows crawled up when she got a hit. She became aware of me watching her and our eyes met. A tacit question.

  Would Simon arrange this, Marty?

  My head dipped. As a cop, it would have been difficult for him to explain why he’d willingly destroyed evidence. The operative word was, willingly. Now he could put the blame on Sam, with no one the wiser.

  Ethics 101, according to Simon. He had no desire to destroy innocent people’s reputations and now he wouldn’t have to.

  Amanda didn’t appear angry over Simon’s deception. I wasn’t either. We both realized that he’d kept us in the dark in order to protect us, should his ruse ever come to light.