“Yes, ma’am.”
“I intend to spend some time there.” She added acidly, “Alone.”
The long-suffering employee smiled. “Whatever you say.” Marcella enjoyed these brief trips out of doors. The tall, big-boned woman pushed the oak-wheeled chair as easily as if the conveyance were empty and the grade on the flagstone pathway dead level. The incline was, in fact, noticeably uphill and the live cargo tipped the scales at 156 pounds. “If I’ve said it once, Miz Hooten, I’ve said it a hunnerd times—you oughten to be so stingy. I swear—you could be Jack Benny’s penny-pinchin’ granmammy.”
The invalid responded tartly, “I believe you have complained about my frugality more than fivescore times, Marcella.” The voice from under the gray headscarf was gratingly raspy, like the harsh shriek of a file being drawn across the dull teeth of a rusty cross-cut saw. “But if you don’t mind getting to the point, what is the focus of your concern upon this particular occasion?”
“Well, I’ll tell you—a rich lady like yourself ought to buy herself one a them motorized chairs to wheel around in.”
“I could purchase a dozen battery-operated carts, Marcella, but what can I say?” Mrs. Hooten said it: “I am incurably old-fashioned, and frugal to a fault.”
“You’re that, all right.” Her paid companion snorted. “But I still say—”
“Besides, if I indulged in such conveniences as motorized wheelchairs, electric dishwashers and such, what would I need to keep you around for?”
“Hah! Who’d cook your meals and pick up after your messy self—and stack your dirty dishes in that fancy ’lectric dishwasher.” Marcella’s broad face flashed a dazzling smile. “And don’t go tellin’ me that you could hire somebody else to take care of you—you know well as I do that nobody around these parts’ll work for you ’cause you’re such a bad-mouthed ol’ grouch and you don’t pay enough wages to keep a mouse in cheese and crackers.”
The maid’s employer smirked. “You certainly don’t show any visible signs of starvation.”
“That’s because I help myself to all those goodies in your pantry. This mornin’ at about two o’clock, I got up and toasted about half a loaf of white bread—and I spread fancy apple butter over ever’ slice and I et it all before I went back to bed!”
“I have always suspected you of committing petty larcenies at my expense, but I do wish you had not confessed. Now I shall feel compelled to count the silverware daily.”
“You go ahead and do that—all I steal is food.”
Mrs. Hooten smiled. Dear Marcella is so entertaining.
The maid pushed the invalid toward a picket-fence gateway that opened into a circular garden which pressed halfway into a forest of oak and maple. Their daily little game and the pathway had about played out. “It’s cold enough out here to freeze my shadder to the ground; I don’t know why you won’t stay inside by the fireplace like a normal old crank.”
“I am not an old crank. I am an aged recluse.” Francine surveyed her tiny hideaway, which was surrounded by a thick hedge. “Call me eccentric.”
“I’d call you silly, ’cept you’d cut my pay to maybe one greenback dollar an hour.”
“An option that I shall consider if you do not mend your meddling ways. But enough of this silly banter; I require a few minutes’ respite from your company.” Remembering her expected guest’s instructions, Francine added, “Wheel me around to the opposite side of the fountain, Marcella, and turn the chair so that I am facing the house.”
This order was carried out without comment.
“Thank you kindly. Now, you may leave me.”
Marcella gave the disabled woman a worried look. “D’you have that little gadget with the red button?”
“I do.” Mrs. Hooten pulled back her scarf to reveal the plastic pendant hanging from her neck. “When I have soaked up enough solitude to satisfy me, I shall buzz for you. Now depart this instant.” After glancing at her wristwatch, she added by way of inducement, “That inane television show that you adore came on two minutes ago.”
“Okay, I’m gone.” The sturdy woman from the Missouri Ozarks patted her employer on the shoulder. “But if I don’ hear that buzzer buzz in a hour, I’ll come out here and wheel you back inside whether you want to go or not!” Having had the last word, Marcella stomped away on the flagstone pathway.
A damp, fetid breeze played with dead leaves.
Empty minutes ticked away toward yesterday.
The pale woman was as immobile as the lichen-encrusted iron porpoise that had long ago ceased to spew water into the fountain, which bone-dry ornament was the dreary centerpiece of a garden where a dozen untrimmed rosebushes that bloomed in June were now but a withered memory of warmer, happier days. The dismal effect had not gone unnoticed by the widow who had recently been deprived of her only descendant; the wheelchair’s occupant evaluated her surroundings thusly: This place looks like a scene from an old black-and-white horror movie. Some eighty yards away, at her shambling, nine-gable Victorian home, the rear screened door slammed shut behind the maid with a bang. Actually, this little garden spot would make a nice cemetery. Francine’s twisted smile was bittersweet. Perhaps I shall have LeRoy buried here. A long, weary sigh. Before too long, I will lay myself down beside my only son … who has been such a disappointment.
As she mused about converting her shabby rose garden into a family graveyard, Francine Hooten’s imagination might well have conjured up the spirits of other members of her close-knit circle who had passed on. Such as the husband who had been shot dead by the Chicago plainclothes cop. Also Francine’s brother, who’d run afoul of a rival South Side gang—and whose body had never been found. Those Oak Park thugs probably set poor Buford into a fifty-five-gallon drum of cement and dumped him into Lake Michigan. The sudden impression of a presence jolted Francine from her reverie. She had sensed neither sight nor sound, merely the slight stirring of another living creature. Her raspy voice rattled a hoarse whisper: “Are you there?”
The reply, from somewhere behind her, was immediate: “I am.”
“You’re on the far side the hedge—completely out of sight?”
Her visitor took no offense at this pointless query. “Certainly.”
“Did our intermediary explain why I require your professional help?”
“There was no need to.” There was a hint of a smile in the reply. “I manage to keep up with current events.”
“Well, just to be sure we’re on the same page, it’s about—”
“Your son LeRoy, who died after being injured by those two small-town policemen in Colorado.”
“Yes. Officers Parris and Moon.” She ground her teeth at the memory of the cops’ grinning faces on the television screen. “You are well informed.” Francine inhaled a deep breath of the chill, dank air and expelled the frosty mist with a compliment: “I appreciate that job of work you did for me a few years ago.”
“Thank you. It is my specialty.” The gun for hire added, “You should also appreciate the fact that my rates are high—‘exorbitant’ would not be an overstatement.”
The invalid assumed a haughty expression. “Despite my reputation for being miserly—when it comes to important matters, I always go first-class.”
“I am pleased to hear it—a vulnerability to flattery is one of my few weaknesses.”
After the partners in crime enjoyed lighthearted laughs, the assassin said soberly, “Assuming that you agree to my standard fee—I can give you my personal guarantee that both of these men will be dead within ten days.”
“That would be gratifying—if their immediate demise was what I had in mind.”
Judging by the brief silence, the person concealed on the forested side of the hedge might have been slightly taken aback. “What do you have in mind?”
After explaining her intent in some detail, Francine added, “I want those two grinning cops to suffer—like I am suffering. But I don’t want either of them killed—not until I am in my grave.
Then, you may feel free to deal with them in any manner that suits you—at my expense, of course. I will arrange payment through our trustworthy intermediary.”
“Very well. Unless one or both of them gets in my way, I won’t harm a hair on their heads while carrying out the immediate assignment. And after your death, I will dispose of them promptly.” Two heartbeats. “But I suggest that you consider the cost—this will be a complex, dangerous task—and even more expensive than my usual work.”
“Name your price.”
The assassin did. Including a substantial advance for “miscellaneous expenses.”
The old woman caught her breath. Held it. Then: “Agreed.”
“Then consider it done.” A pause. “There is,” the concealed visitor said, “one last thing.”
“What might that be?”
“In the pawpaw tree, there is a bird feeder hanging from a branch—within easy reach.”
“I am well aware of that fact. I am the benefactor who provides expensive seed for my famished little feathered friends.” Francine’s mouth puckered into an expression that suggested a porcine smile. “May I assume that you have placed something there for me?”
“You may. And it is to be used only in the case of an emergency.”
“Oh, my—a cyanide capsule?”
“Nothing quite so dramatic. Just yesterday, I purchased a matched pair of inexpensive mobile telephones. One for myself, the other for you. I will keep my instrument for … let us say … two weeks.” Two heartbeats. “If something should come up that I absolutely must know about, you may call the only number listed in your telephone’s directory.”
“I understand.” Francine Hooten’s eyes were focused intently on the feeder. “But such an eventuality seems unlikely.”
“Let us hope so.”
CHAPTER TEN
HOW MARCELLA (NOT THE NAME ON HER BIRTH CERTIFICATE) IS USING HER TV BREAK
Is Mrs. Hooten’s maid enjoying her afternoon television show? In a word—no. In seven more: she cannot stomach I Love Lucy reruns.
The Sony portable television in her second-floor bedroom is turned on, the volume set loud enough to be heard downstairs by the nosy butler—and by Mrs. Hooten, should the lady of the house return unexpectedly. Marcella has withdrawn to a third-floor storage room where cherished family heirlooms (along with miscellaneous other junk) have been deposited for a hoped-for posterity that—with LeRoy Hooten having met his untimely end in Colorado—will never be born to inherit. Yes, even mean-down-to-the-marrow mobster moms look forward to darling grandchildren on whom they can dote.
* * *
From where the maid was seated in a dusty, purple velvet armchair, she could peer from one of the mansion’s rear, east-facing gables. Her sober gaze was presented with a vast, misty vista of forest where the winding ribbon of the Wabash River was shrouded under a vaporous layer of gray, undulating mist. This domestic worker, who earned some eight hundred dollars per month plus room and essential victuals, had little interest in hardwood forests or silty midwestern watercourses, but even if she had, Marcella could see neither the foggy Wabash nor the trees—excepting a few dozen oaks and maples behind the rose garden’s bushy hedge. Her tunnel-vision glare was limited to a patch of earth some ten yards in diameter, her alert mind occupied with delectable suspicions. Unless I’m badly mistaken, the old girl didn’t go out there to enjoy some quiet time.
The maid removed a miniature radio receiver/audio recorder from her apron pocket, unwound a twisted cord that was plugged into the instrument, and pressed the tiny microphone on the other end into her right ear to listen intently to—nothing. What she heard was not dead silence … merely a slight whisper of static. Marcella checked the receiver. I know the thing is turned on. So what was wrong? Either this piece of junk has crapped out on me—or the bug I planted in the old woman’s walking stick has gone on the fritz. There was another possibility, which did not bear thinking about. But she did. Or the rubber plug at the tip of her cane has fallen off and the bug’s lying in the pathway—right in plain sight. She leaned closer to the window, squinting in a futile attempt to see the thing. No matter. Brash as a pit bull on an overdose of steroids, spunky Marcella always dealt with dangerous issues straight-ahead and up front. When I go out to wheel the old reprobate back in, I’ll spot the rubber gimmick, pick it up, and push it back onto Mrs. Hooten’s walking stick right under her nose—and get a well-deserved compliment for having eyes like an old-time Indian scout.
All well and good, but before that award-winning performance could be pulled off, there was a more immediate problem to be solved: One way or another, I’ve got to make a recording of whatever she says to whoever shows up. And she knew just how to do it.
Before the invalid in the wheelchair had opened her mouth to say a word, Marcella removed another instrument from her purse. She focused the miniaturized, gyroscope-stabilized digital video camera’s zoom lens on Francine Hooten’s wrinkled face, centered the frame on the old woman’s mouth, and pressed the Record button. The maid was delighted when the woman began to speak. Marcella shifted her gaze from the camera’s LCD screen to peer out the window. I don’t see anyone, so whoever she’s talking to is keeping well out of sight. Which was good news. Honest visitors do not sneak around like thieves—concealing themselves behind bushes. But just in case the lowlife did show his face, she set the camera to record a somewhat broader view. Marcella was understandably pleased with her ability to improvise right on the spot, and things went fairly well, except that from time to time an elm branch clustered with dead leaves was wafted by a pesky breeze to temporarily block the video camera’s view. Despite this aggravation, the resourceful operative was able to document the movement of Francine Hooten’s lips for more than half the words her employer uttered. Right up to … “But such an eventuality seems unlikely.”
When Francine’s mouth finally clenched in its usual scowl and stayed that way for quite a while, the maid realized that the conversation was over and her summons imminent. Marcella pulled a mobile telephone from her pocket. Like the cheap telephone the assassin had left for Francine Hooten, this top-of-the-line communications device was reserved for serious business. After using a delicate cable to link her miniature Japanese video recorder to the telephone, she punched in a memorized ten-digit number and placed the call.
Almost immediately, a computer-generated monotone on the other end said, “Connection made. Please provide ID and password.”
Marcella recited her six-character alphanumeric identity code and confirmed it with this week’s password (thunderstorm).
“You may proceed,” the robo voice said.
After making a terse, factual report, she downloaded the video camera’s digital memory—all of which was duly recorded on the other end. When she had completed the task, the maid said, “Goodbye,” which would automatically break the connection. She slipped the mobile telephone back into her ample apron pocket and put the video camera into her purse.
This communication had required precisely seventy-two seconds.
* * *
When the buzzer in the kitchen sounded a minute later, Marcella Clay (aka FBI Special Agent Mary Anne Clayton) was downstairs at the back door. The Emory University graduate put on her dull, slack-jawed smile, exited the house, and sallied forth to wheel Mrs. Francine Hooten back into the warm comfort of her home. Falling into character, the counterfeit maid assumed her southern accent as she mumbled, “I’ll fuss at that silly ol’ lady for stayin’ out in the cold so long.”
It would never do the trick in Atlanta, Vicksburg, or Little Rock, but it was sufficient to deceive her singular audience. On her way to retrieve Mrs. Hooten, Marcella kept an eye peeled for the bug, but didn’t get the least glimmer of anything resembling a rubber plug. She prayed … Oh, please please please let it be on the tip of her walking stick. As all those who petition the Almighty know, sometimes the answer is no. Which observation gives the game away. Yes, sad to say, when the maid approac
hed her employer, the bug’s rubber enclosure was not on the tip of Mrs. Hooten’s titanium walking stick.
All the way back to the rear door of the Hooten mansion, as Marcella’s mouth kept up a running commentary on the folly of “an ol’ lady like you exposin’ her feeble self to cold, damp weather,” the special agent’s sharp eyes flicked left and right, examining every inch of the dead grass beside the path. What did she see?
Nada. Zilch. Naught.
Which is to say—not what she was looking for. Which was vexing. Sufficiently so to cause the maid’s speech to drift out of character—but only in her thoughts. Damn. That thing must’ve grown wings and flown away!
As wistful characters in novels said in bygone days, “Oh, would that it had.”
THE BODYGUARD
Yes. The butler who is endowed with good old Yankee get-up-and-go is on the job.
As the maid looked right and left and speculated about walking sticks’ airborne rubber tips, she was observed by the ever-alert Cushing, whose primary mission was to protect the missus of the house from bodily harm, problems with John Law—and deceitful employees. At his lookout post by the kitchen window, the Brit expatriate took note of the American maid’s nervous examination of the ground. It looks like Marcella is searching for something. He wondered idly what that might be. The frumpy woman has probably lost a two-dollar plastic earring.
A small drama, unworthy of his interest. But, having nothing of importance to occupy his idle time and in need of some mild cerebral exercise to stimulate his underemployed intellect, the butler (who carried a 9-mm Beretta semiautomatic in his inner jacket pocket) made up his mind to find out what Marcella was looking for along the pathway.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
FOLLOWING THE COWBOY ASSASSIN
As we now know, Mrs. Hooten’s caller was the very same infamous hired gun whom Miss Louella Smithson had hoped would show up. But the “Cowboy” designation calls for a comment. Here it is: despite the fact that the Federal Bureau of Investigation has a fat file on the suspect, the criminal’s identity has not been ascertained by the nation’s premier law-enforcement agency. This being the case, the title of the Bureau file is “Cowboy Assassin.” (No, the shooter does not specialize in popping lead at western horsemen who wear broad-brimmed hats and high-heeled boots with jingly steel spurs mounted thereon.) “Cowboy” refers to the assassin’s reported choice of apparel. But be forewarned: the evidence along this line is thin and might prove misleading. We trust that more shall be revealed as events unfold.
The Old Gray Wolf Page 5