Alice in Jeopardy

by Ed McBain

  One thing good about it, though.

  He now knows why those kids would’ve got in the car with a stranger. It was their aunt all along.

  Anyway, the hell with it.

  He’s still fifty bucks ahead.

  Jennifer and Rafe are in bed when they read the story in the Tribune. In fact, except for the five minutes it took Jennifer to put on a robe and go out to the mailbox for the paper, they have not budged from that bed since they climbed into it late Friday night. Rafe even called his wife from Jennifer’s bed yesterday afternoon.

  Rafe knows an old joke that goes like this:

  “Do you always tell your wife you love her after you have sex?”

  “Oh yes. Wherever I am, I make a point of calling her.”

  Rafe told Jennifer this joke after he’d spoken to Carol yesterday. It did not seem to trouble him that he had his head on Jennifer’s left breast while he spoke to his wife. It did not seem to trouble Jennifer, either. She laughed when he told her the joke.

  They are not laughing now.

  They have just finished reading Dustin Garcia’s little story.

  “Total bullshit,” Rafe says.

  “What makes you think so?” Jennifer asks.

  “Think so?” Rafe says. “Think? I know for a fact that there is not a word of truth in this article. To begin with, my wife is not a blonde. She has black hair. So does her sister. So it wasn’t my wife or her sister who picked up those kids after school. That’s the first thing. The second thing is my wife didn’t get down here to Florida till yesterday morning, so she couldn’t have been going to Disney World with her sister and the kids on Thursday, whenever the article says it was, that’s the second thing. And the third thing, I was in my sister-in-law’s house, the fucking place was crawling with cops, they know the kids’ve been kidnapped, so this whole story about Disney World is pure and total bullshit. Either it’s something Alice herself gave to the paper to protect herself because the paper was pestering her, or else the cops themselves planted it for some reason or other.”

  “That’s what I think it is,” Jennifer says.

  “The cops planted it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Which means they were working with this Cuban fuck, whoever he is,” Rafe says. “Where’d he get that name Dustin, anyway?”

  “His mother probably was a fan.”

  “Of Dustin Hoffman’s, you mean?”

  “Yes, of course Dustin Hoffman,” Jennifer says. “Who else is named Dustin besides Dustin Hoffman?”

  “Well, this guy, for example,” Rafe says, and taps the byline on the column. “In fact, maybe it’s the other way around,” he suggests. “Maybe Dustin Hoffman was named after Dustin Garcia.”

  Jennifer gives him a look.

  “So you think that’s it, huh?” she says. “They figured this out between them. Garcia and the cops?”

  “Don’t you think?”

  “But why?” she says. “I don’t see what they hope to accomplish.”

  “Here’s his picture right here,” Rafe says, and grins like a barracuda. “Why don’t we just go ask him?”

  Tully Stone, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s regional office seventy-two miles north of Cape October, has copies of all the southwest Florida newspapers on his desk that Sunday morning, but the one that interests him most is the Cape October Tribune. There on the first page of the Sunday section, someone named Dustin Garcia has written a droll little story about Alice Glendenning—the woman Stone’s agents have been busting their asses over—taking her kids to Disney World for a couple of days and thinking it’s comical that everyone’s in an uproar about them being missing.

  “It’s a plant,” Sally Ballew tells him.

  “No question,” Felix Forbes says.

  The two agents read the story early this morning, and then drove all the way up here to Stone’s office at regional HQ, an hour’s drive in very light traffic. Stone was perturbed on the telephone, and he is visibly upset now, to say the least.

  “It’s nothing to worry about,” Sally tells him. “Just another example of the way the Mickey Mouse department down there is handling the case.”

  “Do you think there’s any truth to it?” Stone asks.

  “Not a word,” Forbes says.

  “Pure misinformation,” Sally amends.

  “Did they advise you of this?”

  “That they were planning to do it? No.”

  “Then how do you know it was them?”

  “Who else could it’ve been?” Forbes asks.

  “Maybe the woman herself.”

  “Why?” Sally asks.

  “Let the perps think she’s being a good little girl. Let them think she hasn’t called the cops.”

  “Well, I guess that’s a remote possibility,” Sally says dubiously, “but my guess is a plant.”

  “Shall I call them?” Stone asks.

  “Why not?”

  “See what’s on their alleged minds.” He pulls the phone toward him, begins looking through his directory.

  “He’s probably at the Glendenning house,” Forbes suggests.

  “Have you got that number?”

  “Sure,” Sally says, and writes it down for him.

  “What’s his name down there?”

  “Sloate. Wilbur Sloate.”

  “That’s a name, all right,” Stone says, and begins dialing. Sally is thinking “Tully Stone” ain’t such a winner, either.

  “Hello?” a woman’s voice says.

  “Mrs. Glendenning?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is Detective Sloate there?”

  “Who’s this, please?”

  “FBI. Special Agent in Charge Tully Stone.”

  “Just a minute, please.”

  Stone waits.

  “Sloate,” a voice says.

  “Detective Sloate, this is Special Agent in Charge Tully Stone, calling from FBI Regional?”

  “Yes, sir,” Sloate says.

  “It was our understanding till now that a kidnapping has taken place down there, which of course if true would naturally attract our attention…”

  “Yes, sir, it already has. Agents Ballew and Forbes were down here visiting with us already.”

  Visiting, Stone thinks.

  “I am aware of that,” he says. “But, Detective, I have here on my desk a copy of this morning’s Cape October Tribune, and on the first page of the Sunday section there’s a story written by a man named Dustin Garcia…”

  “Yes, sir, I’m familiar with the story.”

  “Then you know it says the Glendenning children weren’t kidnapped at all, they merely went on a little outing to Disney World.”

  “Yes, sir, that’s what the story says.”

  “Tell me, Detective, did you folks plant that story?”

  “Yes, sir, we did.”

  “Would’ve been nice if you’d told us what you were up to.”

  “Would’ve been nice if you’d told us you had a make on the woman who rented that blue Impala at the airport.”

  Stone says nothing.

  “Or that the name she gave Avis is a phony. Would’ve been nice to know all that without us having to go digging all the way to New York on it.”

  “If we’ve been remiss—”

  “You have indeed, sir.”

  “—then I’m sorry, Detective. But the lines are somewhat blurred here...”

  “They wouldn’t be if we could share information and work this together.”

  “What do you think that story’s going to accomplish?” Stone asks, changing the subject.

  “We’re hoping they’ll turn the kids loose and go on a spending spree.”

  “Have they given any indication that they’re about to do that?”

  “No, sir. But we’re with the Glendenning woman now, awaiting further word from them. We’re hoping—”

  “Does she know you planted that story?”

  “Yes, sir, she has been informed of that.”


  “What was her reaction?”

  “She did not seem terribly pleased, sir.”

  “Neither are we,” Stone says flatly. “It’s my understanding that a ransom was already delivered. Is that the case?”

  “Yes, sir. The drop was made on Friday morning at ten o’clock.”

  “And no word from them yet?”

  “Well, she called…”

  “She?”

  “The black woman. One of the perps. She called Mrs. Glendenning to tell her the kids were okay, and they were checking the money.”

  “What does that mean, checking the money?”

  “I don’t know, sir. Those were her exact words.”

  “And that was when?”

  “Friday afternoon, sir.”

  “This is Sunday. What makes you think they aren’t in Hawaii by now?”

  “They could be, that’s true.”

  “Well, has the mother heard from them since then?”

  “No, sir. What we’re hoping is the black woman and her blonde accomplice—”

  “What blonde? Is this a new development?”

  “No, sir, we’ve known all along it was a blonde woman who picked up the children after school on Wednesday. I believe your people know that, too, that’s one of the things we shared. What I’m saying is the ransom notes are marked, and we’re hoping—”

  “How are they marked?”

  “The serial numbers. The bills are supers, difficult to detect without special equipment. But they’re all A-series bills, and the serial number is identical on each and every bill. We’ve circulated that number to every—”

  “Who the hell’s gonna check serial numbers?” Stone asks.

  “Someone might.”

  “Or someone might meanwhile kill those kids,” Stone says.

  The line goes silent.

  “Here’s what I’m gonna do, Sloate.”

  No more “Detective,” Sally notices. The gloves are off.

  “I’m sending Forbes and Ballew to the Glendenning house. They should be down on the Cape by…”

  He looks up at the wall clock.

  “…eleven, eleven-thirty. Let’s say twelve noon to be safe. They’ll be running the case from now on, and I expect your full cooperation in bringing it to a swift and—”

  “With all due respect, sir, it’s your department that hasn’t been—”

  “You don’t understand me, Sloate, do you? This just went federal on you. The case is ours. Ballew and Forbes are running it from this minute on.”

  Sloate says nothing.

  “Think you’ve got that?” Stone asks.

  “Yes, I’ve got it,” Sloate says.

  “Good,” Stone says, and hangs up.

  He looks across his desk at Sally.

  “You heard,” he says.

  “We heard,” Sally says.

  Ashley is complaining that it’s Sunday, and they want to have waffles.

  “We always have waffles on Sunday,” she says.

  Christine explains that there isn’t a waffle iron here on the boat, but she can make pancakes if they’d like. Would they like her to make pancakes?

  “Why’d we have to come here, anyway?” Ashley asks. “And why can’t I talk to Mommy again?”

  “Yes or no, honey?” Christine says. “Pancakes or cereal, which?”

  “Daddy always makes waffles on Sunday,” Ashley says. “Where is he, anyway?”

  “Up at the front desk. Getting the newspapers.”

  “I’m gonna tell him you wouldn’t make waffles for us.”

  “Fine, tell him,” Christine says. “Pancakes or cereal?”

  “Pancakes,” Ashley says grudgingly.

  Eddie comes back with the newspapers some ten minutes later.

  “She wouldn’t make waffles for us,” Ashley tells him.

  “That’s okay,” he says. “Pancakes are good, too.”

  “Not as good as waffles.”

  “But I see you ate them all, didn’t you?”

  “When are we going home, Daddy?”

  “Soon,” he says. “Why don’t you go watch television awhile? Lot of good shows on Sunday morning.”

  “Jamie?” she says. “You want to watch TV?”

  Jamie nods and gets up from the table.

  “You got a kiss for Daddy?” Eddie asks.

  Jamie offers his cheek, but doesn’t say a word. It breaks Eddie’s heart that his son doesn’t talk anymore. He wonders if that has anything to do with the drowning, some kind of reaction to the supposed drowning. He’d hate that to be the case. But he hates a lot of things about this entire undertaking. He only knows that a man has to do what he has to do. Intently, he watches his children as they go into the forward stateroom. He hears cartoons starting on the television set. He sighs heavily.

  Taking Christine topside, he shows her the Sunday section.

  “What do you make of it?” she asks.

  “Well, we know it isn’t true,” he says. “It’s just some story she invented for this reporter.”

  “But why?”

  “To let us think she didn’t call the police.”

  “We know she called the police!” Christine says. “They followed us. And she knows that, too. I told her we were followed. So why this story in the paper?”

  “She’s trying to convince us she knows nothing about that maroon Buick. She’s telling us the cops don’t know anything at all about this, we’ve got the money now, so just let the kids go.”

  “I think you’re right,” Christine says. “That’s what it means, honey. She’s promising safe passage, is what this story is. Let the kids go, and we’re home free.”

  “If only it was as simple as that,” he says.

  “What do you mean?” she says.

  “Nothing,” he says.

  “No, tell me, hon. What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing,” he says again.

  Wearing a pale blue sports jacket with darker blue slacks, a blue straw hat with a snap brim, and blue loafers with a fancy Gucci buckle, Dustin Garcia feels he looks quite dapper on this sticky hot morning. He comes walking out of the Trib building jauntily, a man secure in the knowledge that he is a big-time celebrity in this little town that is Cape October.

  As he is about to enter his car in the parking lot behind the building, the pair of them suddenly appear. Big burly man, tall beautiful blonde woman.

  “Mr. Garcia?” the man says.

  “Yes?”

  Fans, Garcia thinks. He is not surprised. His photo is at the top of his column and he has even been approached for an autograph once or twice, which can become annoying when a man is having dinner in a restaurant.

  “Few questions we’d like to ask you,” the man says. “Want to come with us, please?”

  “Who…?”

  The man grabs Garcia’s right arm, just above the biceps. He squeezes hard. Not fans then. In which case…?

  “The red car,” the man says. “Right over there.”

  Garcia says nothing as they lead him to the car and open the front door on the passenger side. The man urges him inside with a polite little shove. The blonde takes a seat beside him, behind the wheel. Car doors slam. The blonde twists the ignition key, starting the car and the air conditioner.

  “You know, of course—” Garcia begins.

  “We just want to ask some questions,” the man says.

  “It doesn’t look that way.”

  “It is that way,” the blonde says.

  “All right, I’ll accept that. What are your questions?”

  “Why’d you and the cops concoct that story in your column this morning?”

  “I have no idea what you mean.”

  “About the Glendenning kidnapping. Why’d you make up a fake story?”

  “What kidnapping? I don’t know anything about a kidnapping.”

  “Your Disney World story,” the blonde says.

  “You know those kids didn’t go to Disney World,” the man says. />
  “You know those kids are missing,” the blonde says. “So why the phony story?”

  “Those are the facts as I collected them,” Garcia says.

  “From who?”

  “From Mrs. Glendenning herself.”

  “That’s a lie and you know it.”

  “Look,” Garcia says, “who the fuck are you people?”

  “Language, language,” the man warns.

  The car has cooled off rapidly. Outside in the parking lot, the black asphalt reflects shimmering waves of heat, but it is cool here in the car now, and yet Garcia is sweating. He wonders who these people are. Is it possible they’re part of a gang that took the Glendenning kids? Is there in fact a gang instead of just the black woman and her blonde accomplice, as Sloate and his people seem to think? If so, and if these two are part of a gang, if there is a gang and not just the two women, and if this ape of a man is part of the gang, then Garcia is in danger here. So tell them what they want to know, he thinks.

  Instead, he asks, “How do you know about any kidnapping? If, in fact, there’s been a kidnapping?”

  “You know there’s been a kidnapping,” the man says.

  “The Glendenning kids,” the blonde says.

  “You know a quarter of a million dollars in phony bills has already been paid.”

  As a matter of fact, Garcia does not know this. Neither Sloate nor anyone on his team ever once mentioned that the ransom money was counterfeit. They told him the bills were marked, yes, but they did not say they were fake. So this, now, is a new development. He is once again sniffing Pulitzer prize in the air.

  “Let’s say the children were—”

  “Look,” the man says, leaning closer to him and talking directly into his ear, “let’s cut the shit, okay? The kids were snatched, and you know it. All we want to know is what the cops know about whoever done it.”

  “Did you do it?” Garcia asks.

  “Don’t be a fucking moron,” the man says.

  Garcia’s mind is reeling. If these two are not, after all, part of any gang that kidnapped the Glendenning kids, then who or what are they? And what do they want?

  “The cops only know it’s a blonde and a black girl,” he says, and looks the blonde directly in the eye, hoping she will blink. She does not.