Seymour smiled and made an invitational gesture with his right hand.
“Oh, I see,” Taylor said, smiling back. “This is not a custodial interrogation anymore. It’s just someone asking me to tell him a story, give him a narrative.”
“That’s right,” Seymour said, pulling a notebook out of an inside pocket. He opened it, turned a page, and glanced at it. “That’s right, Doctor. What kind of a doctor?”
“That’s a question, Detective. But I won’t count that as interrogation. I hold a doctorate in astrophysics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. I am assistant director of the Smithsonian’s Air and Space Museum and director of the Albert Einstein Planetarium there. If someone behind that two-way mirror on the wall there goes to a computer and logs on to the museum Internet site and searches my name, he’ll see my face and get positive identity.”
Seymour nodded, and Taylor continued. “Cole Perenchio called me this afternoon. I’ve known him since we both went to MIT. And we later worked at Goddard and NASA Headquarters over on E Street in Washington. We hadn’t seen each other for … I don’t know. About a year.”
“The NASA place up in Greenbelt,” Seymour said, nodding again. “I’ve escorted members who went up there for congressional tours. Yeah, Cole Perenchio. That was the name on his driver’s license. A Virginia license. Expired.”
Taylor ignored the interruption and continued speaking: “Cole said he had something to tell me, but he was very … very, well, I guess I could say paranoid. But he’s—he was—kind of religious, and I think that colors the way he looks at—looked at—things. Anyway, he said it was urgent and could we meet in some quiet place. I suggested my house—on the Hill, Maryland Avenue. Cole said, No, someplace private. Where there won’t be any wiretaps or bugs.”
“Wiretaps? Bugs? What was he talking about?”
“More questions, Detective. The answer is, I don’t know.”
“Tell me more. That’s not a question.”
“We agreed to meet tonight. I thought of the Summerhouse. It’s quiet. I didn’t expect rain. Anyway, I got there, saw he was shot, and dialed 911. That’s the story.”
“I still have questions,” Seymour said, switching off the video.
“Then I need a lawyer. And when do I get my cell phone back? I need to call my daughter. She—”
Both men looked toward the sound of the door opening. Seymour rose and seemed to stand at attention. A short, rotund officer entered. His uniform sleeves had two stripes and his epaulets bore two stars. He introduced himself as Deputy Chief Barnett, the watch commander.
“You are free to go, Dr. Taylor,” Barnett said. “Great Web site. Took my granddaughter to the planetarium a couple of months ago. You are not a suspect.”
“But, we’re not through here,” Seymour said plaintively. He was stunned that his suspect was being given a get-out-of-jail-free card. “We need to have Mr.… or Dr. Taylor here … sign a statement. We need to take some DNA samples. Jesus, boss, Congress, the press will be all over us if we…”
Barnett turned and pointed toward the detective. “Seymour,” he said, “give Dr. Taylor his cell phone.”
Nodding to Taylor, Barnett said, “A car will take you home.”
Taylor stood and walked toward the door. Barnett, standing before the open door, shook hands with Taylor and stood there a moment, looking up. “Sorry for the temporary misunderstanding,” he said. “As Detective Seymour told you, we don’t get many homicides to deal with. If what happened was a street crime—your friend was in the wrong place at the wrong time and maybe you, too, if you had got there earlier—we could handle it. But from what you said—yep, I was behind the mirror—it sounds like maybe there’s more to it. So we’ll probably have to call in the FBI. You are a material witness. So you’ll be part of the investigation. But, of course, you’re free to go.”
Taylor nodded, thanked Deputy Chief Barnett, and moved quickly out the door.
Detective Seymour was not happy. “So tell me how this goes down. We have a guy in custody who’s found at the scene of a murder, and you spring him in less than an hour just because he’s a big shot?”
“Watch your mouth, Detective,” Barnett cautioned. “I released him because I listened to his statement and I believe him. And I don’t want to have a story in tomorrow’s Post that as far as the Capitol Police, the gang that can’t shoot straight, are concerned, ‘No good deed should go unpunished’!
“Dr. Taylor could have walked away from the crime scene and all you would have found was a piece of paper with Taylor’s number on it. So you would have gone to the Smithsonian tomorrow and arrested him on that?”
“Yeah, well all I know is that in this town, money talks…”
“And bullshit walks, Detective,” Barnett shot back. “Don’t slam the door on your way out.”
26
Darlene Taylor was standing in the doorway of a three-story brick house. A hall light silhouetted her, the shadow of her slim body streaming onto a small lawn. Beyond was a low wrought-iron fence that bore a bronze historical marker showing the house had been built in 1877. A rainy breeze sent a shower of orange leaves flying down Maryland Avenue toward the lighted dome of the Capitol, a few blocks away.
When the police car pulled up, Darlene ran to the opening gate in four quick steps and threw her arms around Taylor. She was nearly as tall as her father, even now, in bare feet. She wore gray jeans and a sweatshirt bearing the faded blue letters “USAF.” In a moment she stepped back and said, “Well, thanks for finally calling me … and from a cop car. What the hell was that all about? I was worried sick.”
“Let me in the house and I’ll try to tell you,” Taylor said. “I’m still sorting it out.”
They walked directly through the entry-hall door to the kitchen. Darlene went to the refrigerator. “There’s chicken salad,” she said.
“Thanks, sweetie,” Taylor said, uttering a word that always pleased and mildly exasperated her. She served a helping onto a plate already set, with knife, fork, and napkin at one end of the table in the middle of the kitchen. “Eat and go to bed,” she said, taking her usual chair across from him.
“This is very good chicken salad.”
“Mom’s recipe,” Darlene said softly.
A sudden flash of memory. A neighbor had brought chicken salad to the house after Caroline died. He had taken only a bite of that salad. Now it’s going on six years, and Caroline is sort of still here.
“It’s the curry,” he said. “Exactly enough curry.”
After finishing the salad, Taylor rose, went to the refrigerator, and took out a beer. As he twisted off the cap, Darlene frowned. “A glass of milk would be better for you at this hour,” she said. “It’s nearly one o’clock.”
He sat down again. “A teetotaler like you,” he said, “would not understand that after you’ve been accused of murder, a glass of milk is not quite enough.”
“Murder?”
“Hold on. I told you I was still sorting it out,” he said in a slow, steady voice that she recognized as his lecturing voice. “Yesterday I got a phone call from an old friend, and—”
“Who?” Darlene asked.
“Cole Perenchio. You wouldn’t know him.”
“And he’s the dead man, the murdered guy?”
“Yes. I haven’t seen him in about a year. He was still at Goddard when I left. He told me he needed to speak to me, privately. He—”
“What did he want to tell you?”
“I don’t know.”
“You must have some idea,” she persisted.
“Sweetie, this is a long night. A lot of questions. I told the cops and now I tell you: I didn’t have any idea about what he wanted to tell. I suggested that we meet at the Summerhouse. From there, I thought I could convince him to walk home with me. Where we’d be more comfortable.”
“The Summerhouse? I know you admire Olmsted and the Capitol grounds. So do I. Still, a funny place for some kind of secret meeti
ng. But okay. So you—”
“When I got there, he was on a bench. Dead. Shot in the back of the head.”
“My God! If you had…”
“No. Somehow I feel he was targeted, followed. I don’t think anyone wanted to kill me. But the Summerhouse. I’ll never think of it the way I always have.”
“Neither will I,” Darlene said. “And I do remember him.”
“What? You never would have met him. I never really knew him socially, never invited him home. We were colleagues, guys who worked together. After he left Goddard we kept in touch. Lunch, maybe a beer—well, for me, not him. Anyway, you never met him.”
“Yes, I did. You took me to Goddard on one of those stupid take-your-daughter-to-work days. It was so embarrassing. I’ll never forget it. Here I was, a thirteen-year-old, starting high school, and you were treating me like I was an eight-year-old, holding my hand, bragging about my marks, my cross-country running. Oh, I’ll never forget it. We were in that room with the big centrifuge they used for spinning astronauts, and they were doing a job for the Department of Transportation, seeing what it would take to make a car roll over, spinning a big SUV around and around. That was terrific, but of course I couldn’t tell you that because I was sulking.”
“The centrifuge. That’s right,” Taylor said, amazed at her uncanny ability to recall minor events. “What else do you remember?”
“I had said something about not seeing many black scientists. I was just beginning to go big into civil rights. And you said something about NASA was working on it—you always did have a good word for NASA. And—”
“Well, for good reason,” Taylor interrupted. “It was a good place. And they were always working on increasing their racial diversity.”
“Right,” Darlene said. “And I’m sure things are different now. But I’m talking about my memories. I remember saying something like, ‘Then where are the black experts besides you?’ And you said, ‘Well, I’ll show you a black guy that I sometimes work with.’ And you took me off to the place where they did Earth observations with satellites, and you introduced me to Cole Perenchio. He had an odd name for a black man. I wanted to ask him about it. He was polite but … I don’t know … uneasy. It struck me that he was the kind of person who was a loner and isn’t comfortable around kids.”
“What else do you remember?”
“Not much. Just that I felt sort of sorry for him?”
“Why?”
“Well—you’re going to like this—I think because he didn’t seem to be fatherly. Like he didn’t know how to deal with kids, with people.” She smiled and paused to reach across the table to break off a bite of cheese.
“I do like that ‘fatherly.’”
Taylor paused, lost in memories that Darlene’s memories summoned. The first year without Caroline, the first year as a lonely, solitary father. He had a mind that he tried to keep compartmentalized. But sometimes, that mind blurred then and now.
“You’re right about Cole,” Taylor said. “He was a bachelor, and lots of times instead of going to the cafeteria for lunch he’d just wander off somewhere. Yes, that was the way he was.… Strange.”
27
The GPS on the Mercedes dashboard said that it was 125 miles to the New Jersey Turnpike. By being a cautious driver who happened to have a police radar detector in his car, Viktor Yazov figured he would beat the GPS estimate of two hours and fifty-one minutes by at least twenty minutes, even though he had to stop at all the tolls; E-ZPass gave out too much information.
He paid the toll for Baltimore’s Harbor Tunnel forty-two minutes after leaving Washington, and now the rest of the trip was a no-brainer. Cross the Delaware Memorial Bridge and hit that first stop on the Jersey Turnpike and get that hamburger. Back to home grounds.
Most cars, showing E-ZPasses, whizzed through the entrance to the New Jersey Turnpike. Yazov inched his way up a non-E-Z lane and was handed a toll ticket. A few miles down the turnpike, Yazov turned in to the first service stop, the John Fenwick, named after a seventeenth-century Quaker. Yazov pulled up to a Sunoco pump and ordered an attendant to fill the tank, as usual paying cash, adding a five-dollar tip that earned him a clean windshield. He drove to the parking area and parked in the first row, in a space facing the food court. They hurried inside, visited the men’s room, guardedly avoiding eye contact, and headed for the lines strung out at the counters for the brand of your choice.
Yazov ordered two Burger King combos, fries, and coffee. Kurpanov fidgeted in the Nathan’s line, stammering when he ordered two hot dogs and a chocolate milkshake. They had agreed to take their food to the car rather than linger inside. But Kurpanov insisted on dousing his hot dogs with mustard and ketchup. He was several steps behind Yazov when he hit the button to unlock the car. At that moment Yazov saw two New Jersey State Police cruisers enter the parking lot.
He hit the button again, said something in Russian, and abruptly turned around. He nearly bumped into Kurpanov, who followed Yazov into the food court. He sat at a table near the door and motioned for Kurpanov to sit next to him so both could look through the front window and watch the cruisers as they parked side by side at the edge of the lot. An officer got out of each car.
Yazov leaned forward and spoke in Russian again.
“Speak English, for God’s sake,” Kurpanov said.
“I think they look at our car. These fuckin’ cops, they never get out of car unless they want to ask questions or give ticket.”
“Maybe they’re just coming in for eats,” Kurpanov said. He was unwrapping one of the hot dogs.
“I know turnpike, turnpike cops. You don’t. We go right now. Put down food. Need hands,” Yazov said, standing up. “We drive to next exit, get off fuckin’ turnpike.”
Yazov’s cell phone rang. “Dimitri,” he said. He nodded, spoke a few muted words in Russian, and pocketed the phone. “Dimitri on cop scanner. Car hot. We can’t drive.”
“What? How—”
“I go to car to get gun. You wait a little, then come. Follow me, like you walk to car in back, where cars come in. We hijack car, take to next exit. Dimitri send car there.”
“Hijack? Jesus, Viktor! I—”
“Shut up. I do it. Easy. Scare shit out of driver, make him drive.”
Yazov walked rapidly to the food court’s glass doors. As he neared the car, the radios in the cruisers crackled. One of the troopers opened the driver’s door and leaned in to listen.
“We go,” Yazov told Kurpanov, who meekly followed a few steps behind.
Yazov hit the unlock button, got in, and sat in the driver’s seat. He reached out to the door and pressed a switch under the armrest. Nothing happened. Then he remembered that he had to turn the ignition key to power the access door to the hidden compartment. He inserted the key and turned it. A section of the door lining opened and he grabbed the silver-and-black Sig Sauer P226 with its thirty-round magazine, minus the round that had entered Cole Perenchio’s brain.
Kurpanov stood by the driver’s door. Yazov stepped out of the car, jammed the gun in his waistband under his jacket, and angrily repeated, “We go.”
As Yazov got out of the car, one of the troopers approached, walking along the parking spaces’ white line, toward the driver’s side of the Mercedes. He unlocked his holster, closed his hand around the grip of the gun, but did not draw.
The second trooper did the same and walked parallel to the first along another white line, nearing the car on the passenger’s side.
“Raise your hands,” the first trooper ordered, drawing his gun and aiming at Yazov.
Simultaneously, Yazov moved his hand toward his waistband and the trooper fired. Yazov slumped against the car and tossed the gun across the hood to Kurpanov, who raised it toward the trooper. He shot Kurpanov twice in the chest. As he fell dying, the last sound he heard was a toddler screaming in the Volvo parked alongside his body.
28
Boris Lebed, the President of the Russian Federation, had succeeded Vl
adimir Putin, who had died from what the Kremlin said was “a rare blood disease.” Eloquent and charismatic, Lebed had convinced the voters and the kingmakers that a forty-six-year-old mayor of Volgograd, with a business degree from the London School of Economics, could lead Russia into a truly prosperous era—while keeping the Motherland strong and vigilant.
Lebed had managed to weather an outburst of fury when word leaked that Kuri Basayev was Lebed’s major financial supporter. How could he associate with a man named Basayev, people asked, recalling a horror indelibly recorded in national memory? In 2004, Chechen terrorists, led by a warlord named Shamil Basayev, had seized a Russian school near the border with Chechnya and held more than 1,100 people—including 777 children—hostage for three days. The siege ended with firefights and explosions that killed more than 300 hostages, including 186 children.
Lebed responded with an emotional press conference and survived the criticism. He called Basayev a friend and a patriot “suffering for his name and not for his deeds.” Condemning Kuri Basayev “because of the crimes of a distant relative,” Lebed said, “brings back the dark says of Stalin, when innocent Russians suffered because their names were on lists written by secret informers.” Lebed also revealed that Basayev had served in the FSB, Russia’s Federal Security Service, under its then-director Vladimir Putin. “And if Kuri Basayev was good enough for a future and beloved President of Russia, then he is good enough for me.”
*
Lebed was in what he called his work office, an oak-paneled Kremlin room with a large square desk, when an aide brought in a sealed envelope from Colonel Nikita Komov. Lebed smiled at Komov’s usual form of communication. But when he opened the envelope and read the handwritten note, he frowned and sighed. Komov wanted a meeting, not here in the work office but in the so-called safe room on the top floor. Lebed buzzed for his security detail and said he was going to the Deaf Room, as it was called.
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